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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27431128">Mamihlapinatapai</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/bymak/pseuds/TechnicolorMagicWoman'>TechnicolorMagicWoman (bymak)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>#I still have no idea what I'm doing here, #and some fluff, #spoilers for Part 4, #take a tour of all the seasons for free, #there are mentions of violence, #there's some angst, F/F, Magic Made Them Do It</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 01:14:27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>67</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>195,922</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27431128</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/bymak/pseuds/TechnicolorMagicWoman</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Derived from the Yaghan language of Tierra del Fuego, listed as the “most succinct word,” and is considered one of the hardest words to translate. It allegedly refers to  “A look that without words is shared by two people who want to initiate something, but neither start,” or “looking at each other hoping that either will offer to do something which both parties desire but are unwilling to do.”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Zelda Spellman &amp; Mary Wardwell | Madam Satan | Lilith, Zelda Spellman/Mary Wardwell | Madam Satan | Lilith</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>332</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>216</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Okay... So, my first fic on this fandom (which is highly terrifying since most of the fics I've read for this pair, have this wonderful wordy, and descriptive narrative.<br/>It's ... daunting.<br/>Oh... also, this hasn't been beta read and English isn't my first language. So, all mistakes are my own. (I do take constructive criticism quite well if you are nice :P )</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Zelda Spellman had been invited for supper at the Blackwood’s manor, ‘a great honor that not all, achieved,’ she said</p><p>Truly, dinner for Zelda was nothing more than was an intertwining of delicious torture, the promise of a better future for her family’s name, and herself, along with the possibility of analyzing the High Priest in his own dwelling. Her power-driven side considered the entire event as enthralling.</p><p>Her proud, and more sex-driven side had always known Blackwood had some sort of crush, for lack of a better word, on her. The witch wanted to know how far she could pull and push that bond they once shared. One her family had been against for reasons she understood, and some she would learn further ahead in her life, but those were yet far away to come to pass.</p><p>Zelda arrived at the Spellman Mortuary, ready to get to bed and forget all about what turned out to be a fastidious dinner, with an inane conversation, and then a pregnancy control she had just barely survived. She didn’t dislike Lady Blackwood, per se, but her worries and many questions were trying and tiring. Calming her doubts had taken a better part of her night.</p><p>The ginger was barely keeping herself, her well-known anger, and the carefully hidden pieces of her feeling-self in check when she saw her. At the top of their stairs, clad in a tight coat that (just as most of Zelda’s own clothes) left not much to the imagination while covering everything that was possible to cover.</p><p>“Excuse me, may I help you?” Zelda asked as green eyes trailed down the figure that was descending the stairs as if she owned the place. Her mind fighting between the captivating woman, how her family members had allowed a perfect stranger to wander around the house, the utter disappearance of her family members, and the conversation she was supposedly keeping with the beautiful stranger.</p><p>“So sorry. I was looking for the powder room and that lovely little English lady that told me to wait has been gone for so long…”  Her voice only added to the captivating image, sending all sorts of lustful thoughts through the redhead’s body.</p><p>“And you are?” Zelda asked, interrupting the goddess, ‘the woman’, all the while thanking Lilith for having been blessed with a marvelous multitasking mind.</p><p>“Ms. Wardwell,” the woman said, lowering her eyes for a brief second. The first time they had broken their eye contact since Zelda’s arrival, if only for a few seconds. Still, Zelda had missed the way they had locked onto her green ones. A shy smile followed before blue eyes were back to settle and lock with greens. “I’m one of Sabrina’s teachers, but…”</p><p>Ms. Wardwell trailed off as she walked closer to Zelda. She came so close that Zelda had to take a breath, as controlled power reached her in a full burst with every step the woman took closer to her. “I came here to make some funeral arrangements.” The brunette finished.</p><p>A witch. Zelda could clearly feel the intensity of her power coming in vibrant waves from the other woman, and that only made her wary about her family’s whereabouts. A witch they knew nothing about roaming through their home couldn’t be anything good. It could bring anything good.</p><p>“I see,” Zelda said. Sounding less harsh than she had intended. Struggling to keep her words stern under the brunette’s gaze, who seemed to be as enthralled by her green eyes as Zelda was on those blue orbs looking back at her. She concentrated on her ire and the want to kill Hilda for leaving this femme fatale alone for Satan only knew how long. “And the woman you spoke to? Where did she go?” Her words came as harsh as she had intended now.</p><p>“The basement, I believe. Yes.” Not taking her eyes away from the bluest-ones she’d ever seen, Zelda moved away. Giving enough of a hint for Ms. Wardwell to understand she had overstayed her welcome. “I shall be on my way.” The woman said and walked to the door.</p><p>Zelda followed her almost cat-like moves until the woman opened the door. Ms. Wardwell took her sweet time to reach the door, and even some more, to look back at her. The ginger struggled to keep herself in check.  Feeling observed as a hawk under her prey and keeping the same kind of look on the other woman, Zelda walked to the door. Yet, before she could slam the door closed, an ungloved hand stopped her.</p><p>The redhead Spellman was exceedingly acquainted with several dozens of languages from around the world and was well versed at a native level with alive and dead languages alike. She knew, and people often had praised her, that her diction was captivating, and her pronunciation could put natives to shame. Yet, the word she was about to learn left her completely at a loss.</p><p>“Mamihlapinatapai,” Ms. Wardwell said, eyes locking on greens for a brief second. Was it awe what Zelda read in those eyes?</p><p>Zelda frowned. She hadn’t heard that word before in her long years. Maybe a curse? A hex? But Ms. Wardwell only smiled softly at her. “Good night, Ms. Spellman.” She let out and walked to the night, only slightly jumping when the Spellman’s door was slammed shut.</p><p>Lilith shook her head; it was the first time she had understood how that word came to be. She only hoped it wouldn’t be an issue to fulfill her mission.</p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>That night Zelda Spellman had filed the unknown word somewhere inside her mind, to be thought of whenever she had some time to spare. However, this year things seemed unrelenting. The Spellman’s found themselves solving one chaos after another.</p><p>She had known, deep in her heart, that she wasn’t quite as fit to be a mother to Sabrina, as her own mother was. Not without giving away her cold facade and letting her inner self -her most well-kept secret- out there for anyone to see.  Her own fragility, the reason she had agreed to take care of her niece instead of adopting her as her own.</p><p>Shaking her head to get rid of her current darkest thoughts, Zelda frowned. They had agreed with Sabrina’s mortal family that she was going to receive the proper mortal education providing they remained away. Yet, since her own experience with mortals had left her banged up and bruised, Zelda had let that part to the willing, and less fearful of showing her good-nature, Hilda.</p><p>Now, here she was. Standing outside this building filled with teenage drama and hormones, trying to figure out who this Ms. Wardwell was, and how was it possible that they hadn’t known about this… <em>hedge</em> witch. How was it possible that Sabrina hadn’t mentioned the power emanating from her teacher?</p><p>She found her in her room, students watching her and willingly paying attention to her every word. The dark-haired woman's skill surprised Zelda, who usually struggled with teaching. Unable to accept anyone could be this good by themselves, the ginger frowned. Maybe it was a spell… Yes, a spell on mortal younglings shouldn’t be so demanding.</p><p>Lilith felt the eyes on her, raising her own for a brief second. Blue caught green’s, and a smile was deliciously painted on red lips. The heat of the short and charged staring contest went by past the feet separating them and straight into Zelda’s cheeks. Blushing furiously under such an attractive gaze, completely setting aside the fact that her heart had skipped a beat. The truth was she could get lost in those eyes easily, or at least, that was Zelda’s fleeting thought.</p><p>Someone commented, and the heads of all the students turned around to try to catch what Ms. Wardwell was smiling at.</p><p>They found nothing.</p><p>“Ianuae magicae,” Zelda whispered and teleported herself back home. Placing the back of her hands on warmed cheeks. “What was I thinking?” She berated herself for this bout of reckless action. ‘Mamihlapinatapai.’ The word fleeted on her mind, as if it was expected of her to know what it meant. Or at least, understand the reason she remembered it now, so clearly, after being trapped in shiny blue orbs.</p><p>Back at Baxter High, it took Lilith more seconds than she thought would be necessary to get back on the track she was before. Teaching mortal brains a thing or two about unuseful things that wouldn’t even help them with their pathetic insignificant lives when the Apocalipsis was finally so close to befall.</p><p>Still, the energy that had had trespassed her body, unwillingly and unwanted, had made her heart constrict tightly. The sheer power of the brief exchange was something that, excluding their previous encounter, Lilith hadn’t felt in an extremely long time. Not since the wastelands, not since… The first time she laid her eyes on Lucifer when he was still more angelic than the demon he became. When he looked like the end of her days of starvation and despair. She shook her head. How mistaken she was, and how fearful he had shaped her to be.</p><p>But now, there was finally a chance of getting what he had promised. She was so near to becoming the Queen he had promised to make from her. She wouldn’t let anything to fall in the middle of it. Not even this cursed feeling that had chosen the worst time to appear.</p><p>“Mamihlapinatapai” she mumbled before getting herself in control. Answering the questions posed by her students with half her mind on paying attention to what she was saying. While she reminisced on how she had learned that word all those years ago. When in a failed rite, the Yaghan people had called her by mistake. Wanting someone to bring them the warmth to survive the coldest night they had ever lived.</p><p>Angered by the disturbance of her placid night, she had ignited several fires around them. After that display of her rage, they treated her so nicely, offering to her things she was rarely offered. Asking her to sit with them and share their food. The little they had; they had given it to her.</p><p>She had nothing much to do at that point in her life. Wars being won, people being tortured, and everything under her supposed control she kept at bay. Lucifer was pleased with her for once after millennia. He had spared her from the thousand lashes she was supposed to receive for being idle.</p><p>Sitting there with the Yaghan, watching them laugh and sharing their meal had been an, albeit rare, nice evening for her. One of the elders had approached her, head lowered in reverence. They had no idea who she really was, but they knew she helped them, and that was all they cared about. They hadn’t known if this female would understand at all what he was saying, but she was there. So they hoped she would.</p><p>Lilith eyed him warily, used to being under the most violent side of any man. Slave of their passions, if only to fulfill her dutiful place as Satan’s concubine. A soul was a soul, and her job was getting the more passionate and raged of them all back to hell with her.</p><p>The man sat beside her and explained to her why they had called her. The demoness had listened quietly, drinking to his every word. An honest mistake. She could’ve burned them all for this transgression. Yet, here she was sharing their scarce meat and keeping them warm with the fires she had set out of her rage.</p><p>Her eyes had fallen into two girls who were watching each other from across the fire, cheeks set aflame, and gazes never wavering. Lilith could feel their attraction, yet neither of them seemed ready to make a move.</p><p>The elder had followed her line of sight and smiled softly. “Mamihlapinatapai,” he said, nodding sadly.</p><p>Lilith was thankful that along with her long list of skills, languages were not a barrier for her. She knew them all, even if she had never heard of it before. She frowned in confusion.</p><p>“A look that without words is shared by two people who want to initiate something, but neither make the first move,” she mumbled to herself.</p><p>“Mamihlapinatapai,” the elder nodded, surprised that she had not only understood their language but spoke it with ease.</p><p>“They have been sharing gazes for many moons now. The elders worry, for that union will not produce any offspring, and we are not many to survive for long.” He said sadly. “They are encouraged to find each other for a while, and then, they must be joined to a male they trust.”</p><p>“It’s just two younglings,” Lilith whispered.</p><p>“Indeed, but in their hands also lies our future.”</p><p>She had met them, the Yaghan people, at least a century before the colonizers arrived into that unknown part of the world. Despite their worries back then, they had lasted well into the present. Their numbers shortened to the last two sisters of Yaghan full blood. Lilith had been there to take one of them to the awaiting chariots and watched her disappear into the domains of their own Fake God, as she would do with the last one when her time came. Then another fake God would die soon. Another realm would collapse with no one to keep it alive.</p><p>Yet, here she was… Still granted a life.</p><p>It was a mockery, or some sort of punishment from the fake God towards her, that now when she was a step closer to getting all she ever wanted, Lilith had just realized she still had a beating (and feeling) heart.</p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Stupid Batibat, years of not knowing anything from her. Then the demon had appeared, with the worse timing of them all, to make things go to Heaven. The moment she spotted her, Lilith had known it wouldn’t be long before all the carefully placed front she had created would crumble like a castle of cards.</p><p>All the energy spent on keeping her witchy power under control, so the idiotic child wouldn’t figure out she was a witch. (Something that for an unknown reason hadn’t worked on her older aunt) hung by a thread after that night.</p><p>But what she was supposed to do? Let the half-mortal spawn stuck in a dream? Wait until they’d figured out by themselves how to get out of there? She would be centuries older by then. No, she hadn’t had another choice than to drag herself through two pitiful nightmares before she had reached the teenager.</p><p>At least, she hadn’t reached the older Spellman’s nightmare. The demoness had seen enough in the three ones she got to stumble upon. Once she had freed the teenager, Lilith had kept herself barely at bay from praying to Satan that her own spawn hadn’t given her away. She knew if the events of that night would’ve reached the Dark Lord’s ear, he would recall her to the pit for the punishment she surely deserved.</p><p>She had known that one thing would be unveiling herself as a witch, weaving some mildly inane story related to what she knew about the Spellman’s clan. Another one altogether would be to reveal herself as the Mother of Demons. That could backfire enormously if one of them distrusted her and her Master's plans for their niece.</p><p>For a while, Lilith wondered if the teenager had confided to her aunts about her existence. Hoping that her story about how her father hadn’t fully trusted his own sisters, kept the child from speaking too much. Sooner than she thought possible, the time had come for Lilith to come clean about her raison d’être with Sabrina’s aunts. Well, cleanish… Keeping the lies she had spew onto the teen’s mind.</p><p>The chance had appeared by itself as if a programmed part in Satan’s plans for the teen. Years earlier, some stupid mortal had found Apophis and was being slowly eaten away. The Spellman child, in all her brave stupidity and self-righteousness, came asking about performing an exorcism. Lilith had barely contained her joy when she noticed she was going to push the girl further down the Path of Night. One step closer to fulfill the prophecy. To finally get her crown.</p><p>She drove to the Spellman Mortuary and waited for someone to open the door for her. A dark-skinned warlock opened it, and Lilith, for some reason, felt saddened and disappointed.</p><p>“Hello, I’m searching for the Spellman sisters.” She said while shaking out of the need to see the green eyes she’d found so enthralling.</p><p>“Ah, please, come inside. I’ll fetch my aunties for you. Who should I say it’s seeking for them?” Ambrose asked, walking her to the parlor.</p><p>“I-I…”</p><p>“Ms. Wardwell,” the stern voice she knew said loud enough to make both stop dead in their tracks.</p><p>“Aunt Zee,” Ambrose grinned, but Zelda’s eyes were already stuck in the brunette’s. The young warlock flinched for a second. Zelda Spellman, he knew, was not one for locking eyes with anyone unless it was a power-based fight. Her way to cower the most daring of the souls. Yet, Ambrose had felt no threats in the exchange, just some energy that was quickly expanding to fill every breathable space. Neither woman wavered. “I’ll get Aunt Hilda.”</p><p>“You do that,” Zelda threw over her shoulder, breaking the connection if only to be able to breathe. “Follow me,” she announced, walking to the parlor. “The last time I saw you here, Ms. Wardwell, you were searching for funeral arrangements, yet, you never returned,” Zelda stated. She placed a cigarette on her ring and turned it on. “I hope you don’t mind.”</p><p>“Not at all. That night, it was a misunderstanding,” Lilith smiled dismissively. Wondering if the word she had let out was causing havoc in the ginger’s mind or if, by chance, she knew what it meant. Eyes locked once again, as Zelda sat across from her, blowing the smoke softly out of slightly parted lips.</p><p>Lilith bit her inner cheeks out of the exoticism of the woman in front of her. The translucent white skin barely visible under too prudish dark clothes. The pearls in her wrist shining darker than her skin tone. The red hair, making her oh-so-colorful and delectable. Then, those enthralling green eyes… The demoness couldn’t help to wonder if those lips were as soft as Zelda Spellman looked under her whole stern theatricality.</p><p>“Ms. Wardwell?” Hilda called. After having entered the room but unable to break the tension she had walked into. She felt nothing wrong in this energy, yet something in Zelda’s warded stance, and the way Sabrina’s teacher was holding herself, was confusing for the blonde witch. “What can we do for you? There’s something wrong with Sabrina’s schooling?”</p><p>“Mamihlapinatapai,” Lilith whispered, and like a caress, it settled softly on Zelda’s cheek. The demoness smiled with her eyes fixated on the blush taking the ginger’s features, a beautiful confirmation that her word had reached her intended destination.</p><p>“What was that, Love?” Hilda said, making Lilith blink, Turning around, she faced the one sister who seemed to know her from before.</p><p>“Ms. Spellman. There’s nothing wrong with Sabrina’s schooling. However, I feel I must come clean to you both before my secret comes out, and you distrust me without reasons.” She smiled shyly.</p><p>Zelda had to blink away from her eyes. Inhaling deeply, she moved to sit next to the woman, if only to avoid her eyes. Hilda kept a frown at bay. She could feel something in the air that she wouldn’t dare to name. Her sister, she knew, had a long time to learn how to block her feelings from her empathic skills. Only allowing herself to feel and be felt by Hilda’s empathy when she was desperate or at the brink of breaking. The brunette seemed to withhold the same ferocious grasps in her emotions, which was surprising since Hilda had never felt blocked by Ms. Wardwell before.</p><p>“Is there anything else happening in this room?” Hilda risked. Hoping it wouldn’t grant her a visit to Cain’s pit.</p><p>“She’s a witch, Hilda,” Zelda rolled her eyes. “One that, for some reason, has never come forward in all the years since you’ve known her.”</p><p>“No, love. You ought to be mistaken, I’m sure I would…”</p><p>“Your sister’s right, I am a witch,” Lilith said, freeing the veil covering her powers slightly. Just enough not to showcase the extent of her potential as the demoness witch she was.</p><p>“Oh.”  Hilda let out.</p><p>The tip of Zelda’s cigarette burning red for a second before her lips freed the end and parted slightly to let white smoke out from her lungs. Lilith pretended to break, spewing her web of lies in a heartfelt confession that felt bitter on her tongue. Why? She was exceedingly talented at lying and deceiving. Why this one felt so wrong? Why was it tugging her soul with the long-forgotten feeling of ... Remorse?</p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Knowing she would be the first one they would summon, Lilith had redirected the forming vortex of power to the ground beneath the bed. When the first notes of this exorcism siphoned her magic, the mother of demons tried the best she could to cover that this first bout of energy was coming out from her. The ground trembled as the force of the enchantment pulled her magic force from under her feet and into the swirling field under the bed as if she was just some energy plug they could use for powering the energetic vortex.</p><p>She drew in a shaky breath. Annoyance aside, it would be no good if the two blondes felt the energy spiraling out of her. Leaving her breathless enough that she couldn’t chant the joined verse until they called some more names. The Spellman’s summoned power from other fronts before Lilith could finally forget all about keeping the energies attached to the floorboards.</p><p>She could, technically, expel Apophis easily out of the disgusting body laying in the bed. Lilith could banish the demon, who was displaying a mockery of a struggle to remain attached to the mortal, in a blink of an eye if she so desired. But that would be beyond the point. Sabrina needed to take part in an exorcism and an exorcism she would give her.</p><p>It wasn’t working.</p><p>With her powers being held back, the list of witchy names ending, and Apophis playing hard to get, Lilith reckoned this could fail. She wouldn’t allow that, not really. She couldn’t or this step wouldn’t be fulfilled. She frowned for a second. The energy was growing around them, she could feel it. She could also feel the Spellman’s were growing weak.  Lilith wanted to roll her eyes at the pathetic display of power. If this failed, and Apophis figured out who she was, she wouldn’t only be lashed but forever mocked.</p><p>“Something’s wrong, I’m not strong enough!” Sabrina shouted. With Apophis flying so close to her, Lilith worried he would recognize her and give her away. But the fake God times were perfect, they said, and perhaps there was some truth in this since the door burst open then.</p><p>“Yes, you are!” Zelda Spellman entered the room, and Lilith had to take a breath as the ginger’s power expanded into the room mixing with theirs... With hers.</p><p>One thing was the call the eldest Spellman made to her ancestors. Another utterly unique thing was the moment in which Zelda’s magic joined their growing cumulus of energies as the witch raised her hand towards the demon. Lilith had to gulp, wondering if the ginger was aware of the full extent of her abilities.</p><p>Before the ginger’s arrival, Lilith's power was being siphoned straight from her and into the vortex of rising power. Now, the mother of demons could feel Zelda’s magic mixing with her own, locking with it before together they joined the mix. She hadn’t ever known, seen, or felt someone’s power reaching for hers before, as one, they answered the call of any spell. It waked her curiosity and scared her.</p><p>With Zelda’s help, the event was over sooner than Lilith thought possible, using less of her power too. The demoness had been left to wonder if the reason she wasn’t breathless was the protective way the ginger’s power had intertwined with her own.  Blaming the less affected state of the eldest Spellman, to have been late, and the strength of the power of her lineage she’d drawn in with her.</p><p>If this unusual joining of powers, along with that pesky word that her mind kept repeating whenever she saw (or thought) about the redheaded woman wasn’t worrying her, she would’ve gladly taken the offer for a tea. A rare invite, she knew. One cut short by the one who had piqued her interest. Had she felt it, too? Their joined energies? Lost in her mind, Lilith watched them go.</p><p>“One step closer, Master,” Lilith whispered before she disappeared to the cottage. ‘What was that?’ She thought, plopping herself on her bed. Missing the redhead’s power (and glance) while a pressing feeling sat on her heart.</p><p>Across the woods, Zelda walked the way back home, a bit separated from the two tired blondes. The oldest witch knew she hadn’t used the extent of her powers as she assumed she would need. Still, her thoughts were running a confused marathon in her mind.</p><p>After Ambrose had convinced her, she had transported herself to the farm, a speck of her magic really, that had allowed her to reach them just in time.</p><p>Following the whirlwind of energies beckoning her to the room while windows and doors clattered with vengeance. Chanting voices growing louder; signaling the Spellman matriarch that she had reached closer to her intended destination. Amid the chaos, Zelda had to force herself to take the first step in. The potency of the magic enveloping the room’s every corner, effervescent and invigorating, had made her fear for a second that she wouldn’t be enough. That she wasn’t really needed. That she would disappoint her niece once more... Yet, there it was, that same vibe she had felt while entering her house all those days earlier, bewitching her, tempting her, beckoning her like a siren’s song, sparking her need to join it.</p><p>It, not them. She shook herself out of her thoughts while calling upon her family. The strongest women of their lineage. Ready to spew some more of her ancestors’ names, in case those already called weren’t enough to finish this. Joining the already panting trio, she stood right next to a faltering Hilda. Her sister’s powers were already dimming amid the event, even when surrounded by the vortex of the female powers called to help. Hilda, Zelda knew, was a powerful witch with her own flair. However, her strength usually fell into the knowledge of plants and potions and not exactly on her energies regularly used throughout the day in modicum amounts to make the most of it. It made sense that, of the three, her younger sister was the one who looked the worse for wear.</p><p>Raising her hand, Zelda finally shared her powers to cast this demon out of the abused mortal body. Heartbeat raced on her chest, a blush covered her face and her eyes widened the moment her magic had entwined and locked into one with Ms. Wardwell’s powers, before together joined the energy vortex. Some of Ms. Wardwell's energy went to her and some of hers answered back, leaving her body towards the brunette's. The ginger told herself it didn’t matter whatever rarity her magic was doing, it might just be part of the exorcism, yet she never felt her magic doing the same with Sabrina or Hilda’s.</p><p>Zelda would lie to herself if she ever convinced her own mind that this unification of powers hadn’t brought her blood to a boiling point. She couldn’t negate it had made her weak in the knees like a schoolgirl in front of her crush. It made her feel exuberant... Invigorated. As if she was rejuvenating just by this join. It was bizarre. Sharing her powers in such a way should make her feel tired and depleted… Maybe a bit buzzed, but she hadn’t ever experienced something quite like this.</p><p>She shook her head. It would make all the sense of the world for Zelda if Hilda had felt how Ms. Wardwell energies searched hers, (and her own had searched for the brunette’s). How they had linked together before it surrounded them, empowering Sabrina’s words. She hoped, though, her sister was too tired and too spent, for having noticed such a weird little detail. The red-headed witch dared to take her hopes even further, wishing that Sabrina was mollified enough not to notice the extra spring on Zelda’s steps.</p><p>This added fire, running rampant in her blood. The remainders of the other witch’s powers still mingled with hers, and the exuberance of having been part of something unique and empowering was the motive behind her actions in front of Faustus Blackwood.</p><p>Maybe it was that bout of magic that wasn’t truly hers. What made her feel he shouldn’t be trusted? That she was far better than him? Or maybe it was the way her mind provided powerful blue orbs shining brightly, almost proudly at her, as they had achieved this forbidden task. One that not once had needed of a warlock. </p><p>Be this any other day, and she would’ve not reacted in the way she did. She wouldn't have all but manipulated him to do her bidding so openly. Yes, she was always fierce - a force to be reckoned, really - if they threatened her family. Yet, she was emboldened, empowered by the night, and Blackwood, the poor dear, was never anything more than a man.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Sorry... I just love this episode. Especially the exorcism bit, so I couldn't help myself</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I guess I'm touring through the episodes now... they do what they want, really...</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s been days since their last encounter with Ms. Wardwell, and Zelda was still feeling the remainders of that inexplicable exchange of power they’d done amid the exorcism of Jesse Putnam. Nevertheless, the redhead couldn’t stop herself from thinking about the icy blue eyes that haunted her days, every time she blinked, every time she took a moment to gather herself and closed her eyes... She could see them glinting brightly.</p><p>“Mamihlapinatapai,” she whispered.</p><p>The voice in her head was constantly repeating it, at its own volition and in that same seductive tone the witch had used. Sleep wasn’t helping. Her dreams contained snippets of red lips smiling, a slight wrinkling provoked by it around the icy pools, her seductive voice vibrating in her ears as if that <em>schoolmarm</em> hadn’t whispered it while standing far away from her.</p><p>For some unholy reason, Zelda still couldn’t find the meaning of the word anywhere, and that only added to her utmost annoyance.</p><p>She had barely stopped herself from asking Sabrina to use that internet thing to do research for her, but since Ms. Wardwell was a witch, Zelda discarded the idea after some thought. Most likely this word was some malformed version of some obscure language, and by being an excommunicated, it wasn’t so farfetched to believe that this hedge witch who had been working in the shades for years -and had worked with Edward of all the warlocks- could’ve gotten her hands into some books and grimoires that weren’t available for herself.</p><p>If the fact that her brother was the only Warlock allowed to marry a mortal was something to go by, one could say that as High Priest, Edward was exceedingly well connected in their circles. Zelda remembered fondly how he had always helped her to sate her own thirst for knowledge and her desire to have in her hands the most obscure, old, and rare books he could procure.</p><p>To her parent’s dismay, Zelda had always prided herself on being one of the most studied witches there were. Edward had worried at some point. He was aware of how his little sister could wield more power than he could, and how dangerous her advanced knowledge of the obscure arts could be. Yet, this fear had been groomed by his father, and Edward, later on, had decided his fear of Zelda was unfounded. For her to step over him as he thought she should, Edward would need her help to make The Church of Night, an equalitarian field. She had called him a lunatic when he announced her this.<em> “If our father were to hear this, he would call you heretic, Edward,”</em> she had said to him centuries ago.</p><p>Zelda’s learning passion was the reason the Spellman’s family library could compete in volume and depth with the one at the Academy of Unseen Arts. Its growth was Edward’s doing to please his sister, so she would help him change things she had never dared to question before. When he died on his way to present his manifesto to the Anti-Pope, Zelda had never mentioned his plans of making her the next High Priestess and the position went back to Faustus.</p><p>After reading the same page for the umpteen time, she shook her head. Spellman’s family history aside, there was no telling if Edward had favored this Wardwell witch in the same way. Ms. Wardwell had accepted the mortals in the same way he had. Loved one herself. Well, that was before she, too, had fallen prey to Edward’s charm. While Zelda had disagreed with him in that area. Her own experience was a bad omen over those kinds of relationships.</p><p>“This is getting ridiculous,” she mumbled, closing yet another finished tome, a bit too harshly, raising the dust from years of abandon and sneezing in return.</p><p>Rubbing her face, she sat back and willed her ring and cigarette before she enjoyed one of the most relaxing addictions she had picked up in her many years. Taking a drag, she pondered that this wasn’t the first, and most likely wouldn’t be the last time, that she went through their library with no results as to the meaning of this word.</p><p>Sabrina and their coven festivities had forced her to push her investigation to the side. She should be grateful, really, for the few days of respite. However, the dreams hadn’t stopped, and she hadn’t even bothered to get to bed that night. Above the recent memory created by the end of the barbaric festivity, the word was still floating in her mind in the same whispery tone she said it to her.</p><p>Taking another drag, Zelda thought back to the past days. They only had a couple of peaceful nights, and with Sabrina grounded, the Spellman matriarch was free to lock herself in the library and read. That was until their niece had returned home and found the lamb entrails hanging on their door.</p><p>They had been selected to be a tribute in the Feast of Feasts. It had been years since the Church honored their family in such a way. Not even once in the sixteen years since Sabrina had joined her household. Most definitively, not in the century that the Church of Night was presided by Edward Spellman who, as his daughter, had considered the celebration just barbaric and had prohibited it.</p><p><em>“With our already depleted numbers, a celebration like the Feast of Feasts could only help on the extermination of our kind, Zelda. You of all people know how difficult is to bring a child of the night to life nowadays,”</em> he’d said when he first called it off, and Zelda had agreed.</p><p>Still, not happy with expressing her points of view and embarrassing her Aunt in front of the coven, Sabrina had forced everyone’s hand into blackmailing Faustus Blackwood a second time. Truth cake aside, Zelda knew that a man like him didn’t take those things lightly. The eldest of the living Spellman was just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Yet, she knew her leverage was good as long as Lady Blackwood continued to carry their twins. Even so, she was aware it came with an expiry date.</p><p>At the end of the night, a few hours ago really, they had left the Feast of Feasts in one piece and almost unscathed. It had cost the redhead greatly though since Sabrina had also forced her to confess that if push came to shove, the Spellman matriarch would’ve stood up against everything the feast represented to keep her niece alive. Maybe even sacrifice herself to appease the others. It was a chink in her armor, that girl, and Zelda knew this.</p><p>If the days after Sabrina’s ill-fated dark baptism were something to go by, they only had proven this to be a dangerous game to play. Yes, her niece was half-mortal, and as a mortal teenager, she battled her every step. Embarrassing her, covering their family name with darkness. With no brother to take charge, Zelda was the matriarch, the sole responsible of them all. Her family had always come up first. She would restore her family’s name luster, no matter how dangerous the game. Thrilling throb running in her blood from some ill-timed witch or not.</p><p>Besides, Zelda had dressed herself in a fortress of ice and pretending to be tougher than she was. If she let no one in, or even near, who would be able to tell how soft she was inside? It made it easier too because no one dared to play her. Her haughty looks and easily irked humor keeping everyone away from her. Everyone except the ones living under the same roof. She could keep the owner of those blue eyes away.</p><p>Finishing her cigarette, she decided she ought to start the day (no matter how she hadn’t managed to end it before), daydreaming of blue eyes and whispered words be damned. There was no room for dilly-dallying anymore. She searched for Hilda, and couldn’t find her until Sabrina reminded her about that job in that pesky store and a desecrated version of a Black Friday.</p><p>And then… there was that call.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Greendale was indeed a small town. Lilith had figured this one out a long time ago. She knew there were some worst places to live too. Smaller even… Yes, even now so many years after she was born.</p><p>A proof of that truth was that, even on a holiday, and living as far away from town as she could possibly live, she still had found out about the mine collapse in hours’ time, even without Stolas' help. It was the only thing everyone in town was talking about, her familiar informed her when she sent him out for information. She smirked, this mishap… It had magic painted all over it. Perhaps the visit to the Moon Valley had been as fruitful as she had hoped.</p><p>Now, she had to figure out if the Kinkle boy had perished or not, to decide how to go about her next step into pushing Sabrina’s further down into the path of night. The mother of demons closed her eyes and took a deep breath, attempting to get the strength she would need to consort with mortals. She groaned, she had forgotten an insignificant detail.</p><p>Once again, as her lids lowered, hoping to take her world into the darkness, she saw it. Emerald green orbs shining brightly with something she couldn’t quite name, tempting lips pursing, a white cloud of smoke covering her expression, and that soft-looking, rose-gold hair glowing like the fires of hell… Lilith's heart skipped a beat.</p><p>“Oh, Heavens! What has gotten into me?” She wondered as she stomped out of her cottage towards town. The truth was, the demoness could still feel the witch’s energy in her blood. Something soft, as delightful as it was tempting. Safe. Making her feel ... <em>Fluffy</em> on the inside. Plain bizarre.</p><p>A fleeting thought advised her that this could be what mortals and witches deemed as ‘feeling at home’. Lilith never had one before. The garden had been magnificent in all its Godly design. Yet, she had never quite felt a part of it. The wastelands were a nightmare. She had learned enough to survive and had frolicked with the surrounding beings at her own whim. Fun times of discovering herself. Until Lucifer and the pit. Hell… Well, it was hell, what else could one expect from it? So, how could she know if this<em> thing</em> so different from anything she had experienced, was what home was supposed to feel like? How could this be the meaning of home? If it wasn’t something tangible? Somewhere she could be free. Instead of this weird magical behavior that allowed some witch’s magic to run freely mixed with her own.</p><p>She shook her head, trying to shake up the remnants of that connection leftover. Lilith was starting to believe it wouldn’t be possible to get rid of it. As faint as it was, it hadn’t dulled over the past days. At least, it hadn’t grown beyond seeing Zelda Spellman every time she closed her eyes.</p><p>Lilith’s few hours of sleep have been continuously plagued with images of the redheaded woman. Her mind providing with so many parts of the Spellman witch form even if the mother of demons hadn’t even remember looking at her for that long. Damned to hell, her gift of photographic memory. Translucent white hands, dark tights covering her legs, the way the fabric of her temptingly prudish clothes hung to her every bit. She whimpered. Her cheeks reddened by her betraying thoughts. Praise the Fake God for small mercies, as she didn’t need to sleep that much.</p><p>Thank Satan, Greendale seemed to be stuck in wintertime even if they were merely in fall. She could easily blame the burning on her cheeks on the frigid air of the town. As Lilith reached the main street, she remembered once again how small this town was. Word traveled exceedingly fast. By the time she reached Dr. Cerberus’ store, she already knew everything there was to know.</p><p>To Lilith’s dismay, she had to suppress her disgust, and the desire to hex the weird sisters for their failure, when she found out the Kinkle boy had survived. Instead, had expressed her relief to know “such a good boy had come out of the mines almost unscathed, almost magically unharmed.” Sabrina’s doing if she was betting on someone. Now, how was she supposed to get the half-mortal child to resuscitate someone when there was no dear boyfriend dead? Then she heard it. His brother, dear old Thomas, was still missing. The mother of demons knew enough of the Kinkle’s story to figure out there would be some level of attachment between the siblings. Maybe there was hope after all?</p><p>She mingled with the town, figuring out how to proceed. It took some time, but dust seemed to settle down finally. Thomas Kinkle was pronounced dead, albeit no body was found. Once the arrangements for a funeral were done, they were published for anyone who wanted to join their grief. Lilith found herself walking towards the Spellman’s Mortuary for that event. An excuse to check on the Spellman's spawn. See if she could nudge the idea of necromancy into the disgustingly innocent blonde while pretending she was there because she cared about this town and the suffering of its people. That she cared about Sabrina’s feelings of all the things.</p><p>No, she wasn’t there to gather more versions of the redhead expressions for her mind to torture her with. It wasn’t her fault that Zelda Spellman had caught her attention the moment she entered the house, and even later as she spoke with the niece, for a fleeting eye-locking moment, as the witch stood to the side with her nephew. Dark clothes covering her as protective armor. Giving her a mysterious and dangerous aura while she kept herself respectfully away from the mourning people. Or protectively separated from mortals.</p><p>That thing, the redhead witch's magic, in her blood hummed stronger whenever she was closer to the redhead. As if it knew that glorious looking woman was where it had come from. The mother of demons peered from over her shoulder, her glance connecting for a brief second with the emerald orbs. Had she felt Lilith’s own power humming in her blood too?</p><p>“Mamihlapinatapai,” her voice whispered in her head as Lilith forced herself to move inside the room, away from that stare that, even if only for brief seconds, seemed to connect with her soul. Reminding her she still had one.</p><p>To her utter disgust, she sat next to that hideous man, Hawthorne. Lilith had tried to remain still, even when she could feel the green eyes on her back as strongly as she could feel Hawthorne's fingers slightly touching her thigh. The mother of demons swore to herself that she would eat the man one of these days. Crossing her legs and positioning herself as far away from him as the short bench would allow it.</p><p>Why this bothered her now? As Lucifer handmaiden, she was used to men doing this kind of stuff to her all the time. She excused it with the fact that the man was smarmy, but not one that she (or Lucifer) would go after. Hawthorne was all handsy and pathetic. Nothing quite like the souls that had used her and her body in their exchange of souls and power. No, this man’s soul wasn’t worthy. That was it… It had nothing to do with the eyes burning holes on her back or her power throbbing mixed with Lilith’s own.</p><p>At least, her suffering had paid out. The way the child had run away from the room in search of her beau. It wasn’t just it. It was the little thrill she felt running down her body when Zelda Spellman had raised her hand and stopped Mr. Kinkle from punching his son. A soft display of power. Arousing. Enthralling. Lilith had not much time to dwell on this, or why she had felt it so closely. Her crown, the current unblemished state of her back, depended on her cunning skills.</p><p>She couldn’t stop to analyze strange feelings and bizarre power hummings creating havoc in her body, not now. Not when she could be a step closer. Not when there was so much at stake… No… No matter how this thing demanded her attention. She focused on tempting Sabrina, hoping the girl would take the bite, again.  She took the girl to town, seeing her family was too occupied at the moment.</p><p>Turns out, she didn’t need to plant any more ideas on the girl. Sabrina Spellman already had ideas, and Lilith was happy to tell her no.</p><p>“Tell no to a teenager and that’s exactly what they’ll do," she thought.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hum... so I guess we are going darker now...</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The morning had been exhausting, as they prepared to receive the people from Greendale that would come to help the Kinkle’s saying goodbye to Thomas. Half an hour before the marked hour in the afternoon, Zelda saw Ms. Wardwell entering the house and couldn’t help to follow her moves, just like she could not stop the humming-like feeling in her blood. The redhead saw the witch walking around. Getting to the other end of the house, mingling with guests. It didn’t reassure Zelda in the least, it outright worried her when she had lost any trace of the brunette’s delightful figure.</p><p>“Delightful?” She thought.</p><p>Out of custom, Zelda and Ambrose remained in a corner of the room, manning the distribution of the Memorial Service program, while Hilda welcomed people. Usually, Sabrina helped her sister. However, her niece was touched closely by this one and was taking her time to get around. Her blood hummed loudly, and it caught her breath with no other reason than having spotted the Wardwell witch again. The woman’s dark wild mane moving freely in all its distracting glory, as the teacher talked with her miserable-looking niece. Zelda’s clenched her jaw before some mortals distracted her. The disturbance wasn’t enough to make her forget that she didn’t trust the witch at all, and the thing running in her blood wasn’t helping her at all.</p><p>They crossed glances again as Ms. Wardwell walked inside the Chapel of Rest. It was brief and charged with unspoken words. Except for that one that kept repeating itself. “Mamihlapinatapai,” Zelda thought, and for some reason unknown to her, the hum in her blood throbbed even stronger. The hum, the Spellman ginger knew, didn’t belong to her. It was that thing that was transferred over to her for some unknown reason. It was the power of the other witch still dancing in her bloodstream as if recognized it had come from the owner of the blue eyes that locked with hers.</p><p>Zelda could easily spot the teacher in the crowd. Seating besides that disgusting man, Principal Hawthorne. The redhead scrunched up her nose for a second, thinking about the few occasions she had been in the same room as that disgusting little man and how she had desired to burn him in place. She could feel her hands warming with her magic, her power growing as if reading itself to attack. Ambrose elbowed her. “It’s everything, all right, Auntie?” Her nephew asked, and she nodded, with her eyes fixated on Ms. Wardwell’s head as if making sure that poor excuse of male, didn’t touch a hair on that woman’s head. Clenching her jaw, Zelda concentrated on the words coming out from Harvey. Having lost a brother herself, she could feel his grieving words cutting deeply.</p><p>Then it happened. The usually friendly boy stood up to his father and everything went to Heaven. She saw her niece rushing towards her boyfriend. Whereas the lot of them tried to stop Mr. Kinkle from going after Harvey, they couldn’t stop him. They couldn’t hold him long. The irate man rushed behind his son, and the Spellman matriarch had followed close behind.</p><p>Zelda Spellman was rarely one to display her power in public, be this witch or mortal world, but when she saw him raising his hand to punch the cowering boy, the humming in her blood had grown and she had stopped that man simply raising her hand and taking control of his, and stopping his arm midair.</p><p>It wasn’t long after that before the house had grown almost empty again. Hilda had disappeared back to Doctor Cerberus’ shop. Sabrina still hadn’t returned from wherever she’d disappeared. In the house's stillness, Zelda found her way to the library to bury herself in the books as it was her custom. With a book opened in her hands, she had focused on her thoughts so deeply, that the eldest Spellman hadn’t noticed when, as per usual, Ambrose joined her.</p><p>“What have I done?” she mumbled after thinking back to that afternoon. Ambrose raised his eyes for a second, but nothing more came from his Auntie.</p><p>“Amazing show of body parts control technique, Auntie Zee.” He had whispered almost in awe minutes later, hoping to prod. They were alone, both pretending to be reading with noses deep in old books. Hiding in the love for reading they both shared.</p><p>“Don’t ever mention it, Ambrose.” She answered bitterly. Totally humiliated by her lack of self-restraint. For the way she had acted without a second thought, ‘certainly, there must have been another way,’ she thought.</p><p>“Why not, Auntie?” The warlock asked, lowering his book.</p><p>Ambrose’s passion for reading grew from childhood visits to the Spellman Mortuary. From hours sitting just like this with his Aunt Zee. Each one immersed in their own book. He admired her; and he told her that much. When they sentenced him under her protection, the young warlock was almost giddy with excitement. Still, not even once, in the long years since he met his Auntie, had he seen her using her powers for something that wasn’t educational, healing, helping, or self-care.</p><p>“As Sabrina would say, I totally lost it, Ambrose. It’s not like me…” Zelda shook her head, lowering her tome too. She smiled fondly at him. There had been many nights like this one, where it was just the two of them and the many books of Spellman’s library. The boy would litter her reading with never-ending questions, looking at her in awe for some reason she’d never quite understood. As he grew older, his questions became more incisive and their relationship matured. They’d closely bonded over his entrapment and her excessive cautiousness.</p><p>If she ever allowed her, Hilda would feel her feelings. But if she ever allowed him, and she had indulged him sometimes, he could almost read her mind.</p><p>“You stopped a man from beating his own grieving child, Auntie. Where’s the wrongdoing?” The warlock wondered. It wasn’t an obvious spell unless you were a trained witch. His auntie had raised her hand and stopped the man’s arm from moving. It didn't look that bad for the outsider. So, Ambrose couldn’t really see the fault on it.</p><p>“In public? With so many mortals leaving our house by then? Really, Ambrose? Did you not see the way Mr. Kinkle walked around me as if I had… As if I was…” She trailed, unable to say the word.</p><p>Zelda wanted to say she hadn’t experienced this before, that she hadn’t ever feared a mortal discovering her truest nature. The eldest Spellman wasn’t by any means ashamed of being a witch. It terrified her to be discovered as one.</p><p>There was something only Edward had learned while on his quest to convince her that mortals weren’t the enemy. He had learned that in her traveling years, Zelda had been trialed as witch not only once, but twice. Escaping the first one was a mockery, a quick transportation enchantment, and she was out of the bonfire. Yet Zelda had barely survived the second time it had happened. That time… The second time they trapped her in a bonfire, fearful warlocks threw the igniting torch, keeping her grounded, and Zelda was certain she was going to die. She couldn’t quite remember how she got out of that situation, but she had. That experience was, Edward had pried out of her, the real reason she never left Greendale after her ultimate escape from being almost burnt to death by her own kind. And the motive behind her reluctance to help him those last years.</p><p>No one else knew that, and no one would if she had a say in it. Word of how a group of Powerful Warlocks failed to kill a witch wouldn’t come back to Greendale. Or at least, it hadn’t so far. She had woken up in the nunnery of Saint Brigid of Kildare. With her complexion and fast healing, the nun’s had deemed her an incarnation of their Saint and helped her to heal herself enough. Then Zelda had returned to Greendale, with her body still in shambles, her mind torn into thousands of pieces. Strong enough, she donned her next hat. Zelda Spellman had to become the most devout, dependent, and weakest witch there would be. Weakness, in everything occult that needed power, became part of her armor.</p><p>“As if you were a witch?”  Ambrose asked, trying to understand the nervous vibe coming from his Auntie in powerful waves.</p><p>“Precisely.” She agreed too quickly. Fighting with herself, and with the emotions that were threatening to drown her. With the stupid blue eyes, that witch’s tantalizing smile, and that stupid word coming from that delightful mouth.</p><p>“I fail to see the issue, Auntie.” He prodded, hoping she would lower her barriers and let him in once more. Zelda shook her head, walls growing thicker, even when there was this glint of desperation in her eyes.</p><p>“You wouldn’t understand, Ambrose.” She said, voice trembling while she lowered her eyes. Unable to keep her gaze on him.</p><p>“Auntie Zee, you are by far the strongest, most knowledgeable witch I’ve ever met. Yet you never claimed it so. Why?” It had always bothered him. He had lived in the house when Edward was still alive, and his uncle had explained to him it wasn’t well seen. His priest, the eldest of the Spellman at that time, had explained to Ambrose they would consider his Auntie dangerous if anyone else knew her as they did.</p><p>“Don’t you already know the answer, Ambrose?” She countered, knowing he had pestered Edward back in the day. Zelda was saved by the bell then. As if Satan himself had sent him on her way to pay the price of her actions, Father Blackwood entered her house.</p><p>Zelda Spellman was confused, worried… Failing. She craved for confession, for absolution, for someone who wouldn’t look at her poorly if she revealed feeling utterly at a loss. Truth to be told, the ginger wanted to talk about those eyes, about that mysterious word, about that… <em>witch</em>, and how her body hummed, chanting in need, boiling her from the inside, whenever the brunette was near.</p><p>Father Blackwood as her priest should be able to offer her such kind of comfort. She had never confessed to him before. No, she had never confessed to anyone before. Desperate times…</p><p>When she sought Father Blackwood’s advice, the confused witch failed to see the pleased smile that appeared on his face when she kneeled in front of him. If she had, things would’ve been different in the upcoming months.</p><p>Unexpectedly, the redhead never mentioned Ms. Wardwell or anything related to her. By mistake, when Faustus confessed to being untouched, she fell for it as a scapegoat. He’d showcased his need so she would feel it, and it brought forth the burning feeling under her skin. That throb in her bloodstream that had pleaded for a consummation all that day. With the brunette so close to her and yet so untouchably far away. Zelda didn’t want him, that was for certain. She wanted the strange woman that had appeared into her life all wild and untamed, to be devoured by her, ravished until she couldn’t think anymore. To feel those red lips that had been taunting her since that first night she saw her. No, Faustus had nothing on her...</p><p>As his lips touched hers, she fought with her mind. Willing her body to relax and allow for this release. It hurt more than it calmed her. Zelda wasn’t ready for him, and he was done before she had even attempted to reach her peak. All because the only thing she could see in her mind’s eye as she kissed harsh lips was the softness of red ones. As he scratched her back and buried himself in her, all she could think was that women were softer in their toughness.</p><p>All Zelda could think when he collapsed on top of her, was how wrong it was when it wasn’t in her arms.</p>
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<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lilith couldn’t be prouder of herself. It had been years since she felt that she had accomplished something of greatness. The last time she did, some centuries earlier, she had saved a young witch from her certain death. She wondered whatever happened to that witch; then, she shook herself back to the present. Earlier that day, Stolas had overheard a chat between Sabrina and Hilda. The mother of demons had learned all she needed to learn, thanks to that. It wasn’t difficult to imagine what the blonde spawn would do. Lilith wouldn’t have planned it better herself.</p><p>She was sitting in front of her fireplace, drinking a warm cup of tea when she dropped it out of pain. She felt a tug in her heart, a need to scream that begged to be released. She screeched, leaving out frustration and suffering. Things that Lilith knew had nothing to do with her own. Her blood thrummed in agony. Her own power raising in fury in response to this feeling of betrayal, she did not understand where had come from.</p><p>Well, she had an idea. If the way the remnants of the redhead’s power bubbled under her skin, in a hurting throb, was of any indication.  The demoness fell out of breath, burned, used. “What in heavens was that?” She panted, placing a hand tightly against her racing chest. As she hadn’t in centuries, Lilith cried herself to sleep.</p><p>The next morning, the mother of demons was curious to see the redheaded woman. To figure out what had caused the crying fit, she had the previous night. The angriness, the unworthiness, bubbling under her skin. For once, Lilith was at a loss on how to approach it. Zelda Spellman’s well-being wasn’t part of what she came to do. Besides, her duty was grooming the Spellman spawn as her replacement. It was better if she established no more bonds with her aunt.</p><p>“Bonds?” Lilith shook her head. There were no bonds between her and Zelda Spellman. Just some bizarre magic rebound that for sure came from her name being called forth for that exorcism. Yes, that was it.</p><p>She convinced herself it didn’t matter. Some more weeks from now, she would be back to the pit with her crown on her head. Before she left for work, she magically fixed the havoc created by her screech the previous night. She shouldn’t delay herself longer than needed. It wasn’t the school that was worrying her but seeing that Sabrina got everything she needed to fulfill yet another step to pave the road to her Queendom.</p><p>The witching hour neared its end, and as she watched Sabrina killing a witch -A gleaming spark in the teenage eyes said she thought she could outwit death- Lilith could forget about the pain that had taken a hold of her soul since the previous night.</p><p>Now it was waiting time. Lilith walked back to her cottage, laughing herself silly at the whole situation. It was exhilarating, knowing she was so close. She still needed Sabrina to sign her name on the dotted line, but not even that thought could bring her from her happier mood.</p><p>The demoness stopped before entering her house. Taking a deep breath, enjoying the coolness and stillness of the surrounding forest. Lilith closed her eyes, those emerald eyes glinted in the dark. Tempting red lips a shade or two lighter than her own appeared in her mind’s eye. She licked her own lips, arousing energy bubbling inside her. Yes, she should feast on herself to celebrate checking out another line on her to-do list.</p><p>After entering the cottage, the demoness finally had dwelled on what she had felt the previous night, and the little she knew about that weird power exchange. Still, whatever this was, she was feeling Zelda’s magic humming in her veins, waking and tempting her own power.</p><p>“If yesterday’s event was what I think it was…” Lilith whispered, pressing her heart, remembering the pain vividly. “Could this hum be progressing to a small share of extreme feelings?” She wondered. It made some sense. Feelings could power magic, and that was why self-control was a need in the witches’ world.</p><p>She caught her reflection in the mirror and gave herself a sultry smile. An idea forming in her mind. “Pain for pleasure… Ms. Spellman, pain for pleasure.”</p><p>Whatever Zelda Spellman had done the previous day, Lilith was going to erase it from her body’s memory. Loving herself, she smirked. The pursuing of ecstasy should be strong enough to be felt through if what she had thought was indeed happening to them. Sending Stolas away for the night, she settled the environment. Dimmed candle lights, the fire flaring in the hearth, painting the room in the orange tones of a warm summer dawn. Soft notes of a cello concert in the background transported her to peaceful times. Finally, she threw a plush quilt in the middle of it all.</p><p>The demoness started her one-woman show, letting her clothes fall to the ground and mixing up soft caresses with harsh touches, making her own blood boil easily. Expertly. All the while thinking of creamy white skin, rose-gold hair, and soft lips. Imagining how soft it would feel if she entangled her hand in those red locks, pulling the witch's head where she wanted it.  Moaning, Lilith stopped herself from crossing the brink. With a pleased smile, she suckled her lower lip and panted, waiting until her breath was back to normal before she started her self-exploring again.</p><p>For a second, she wondered if this wasn’t a form of abuse. Overstepping the boundaries of this connection they seemed to share, but none dared to pursuit. Lilith had been abused time and time again, so she worried. Until she felt it, the humming answering back. In the same aroused state, she was in. “Oh,” she let out.</p><p>The moment Lilith started her quest; across the woods, Zelda’s blood hummed aroused for no reason. The redhead felt positively glowing, blushing fiercely as if… Her breath quickened. Everything around her blurring around this passion-like burning feeling that was throbbing in her blood. With no explanation, she felt the bubbly feeling of her climax rising with the foreign power beneath her skin. As brusquely as it had started, it stopped. Leaving her breathless and unfinished, wanting for more.</p><p>She grunted when it stopped, needing to cross the line, to walk herself to oblivion in her hands. Zelda knew this aroused state wasn’t her own doing, yet she was decided to answer the call. She grabbed a quilt and walked herself to the guest room.</p><p>Suckling her lower lip, she settled herself on the rarely used, but clean bed. Zelda closed her eyes, willing herself to think of Faustus because he would be a better pawn in this unknown game they were playing. However, it didn’t disappoint her when her desire betrayed her mind. Icy blue eyes, red lips, and that mane… It wasn’t hard for her to climb to the peaks she was in before.</p><p>Back in the cottage, the demoness gasped for air. Was the witch really doing what she thought she was doing? Lilith couldn’t take it. She was, after all, considered a sex demon in many religions for her insatiable needs. Why wouldn’t she take this chance, now that she was almost certain the witch wouldn’t mind? So, with a smile, she did exactly what she wanted.</p><p>Not so long after moving to the guest room, Zelda’s body shook and her eyes rolled behind closed lids. Images of the brunette took over whatever part of her mind that was still functioning, The humming sensation didn’t stop, pulsating with foreign ecstasy mixed with her own. Making her feel alive. It was too much… It wasn’t nearly enough.</p><p>“What is this?” Zelda mumbled worriedly once she could finally breathe again. She cleaned herself the best she could and returned to her own bed. Curling to her side, the redhead was sure she could feel the phantom warmth of someone sleeping against her back, a heavy arm placed over her waist, and a soft hand opened over her abs. In her half slumbering state, she pretended to take the not existent hand and press it tightly against her heart. It felt like home.</p><p>Zelda felt positively glowing the next morning, relaxed beyond her own expectations. She felt soft and well-loved. Ready to face any issues that life could throw at her. She had doubts about this, but just like with that word, Zelda had found nothing about shared powers or whatever synonym she could think for it.  Even with her lack of knowledge, there was one thing she didn’t doubt. She was aware of what Ms. Wardwell was doing the previous night. A shade of pink covered her cheeks when she considered this could be two-sided, and the brunette herself would have some idea of what Zelda had done, too.</p><p>“However am I going to face that woman?” Zelda wondered as she tried to hide her blissful status from anyone in her house. Zelda considered she couldn’t exactly confront the woman about having some adult time when she too had... Oh! Her thing with Faustus! Zelda’s blush deepened, “had she felt that too?”</p><p>Frantically, she searched for Ambrose and found him in his room.</p><p>“Ambrose, I need your help.”</p><p> </p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Let me know if you think I should raise the rating out of general audiences. I'm never too sure where the limits are :D</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Chapter 9</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>After that delightful night, Lilith woke up feeling utterly refreshed. Biting her lower lip with a mischievous smile on her face, she touched herself. As she did, the demoness wondered if Zelda would feel her arousal as vividly as the previous night. Chuckling at the idea of watching the witch squirm from a need that came pulsating in her veins thanks to the remnants of Lilith’s own power. All the while trying to remain stoic in front of whoever member of her family she was in front of.</p><p>The mother of demons never knew it was Hilda, the one who had left the house feeling worried about the mix of her sister’s flushed status, and the mention of a faltering “Fa-father Blackwood” coming from her older sister.</p><p>As far as Hilda knew, Faustus Blackwood was a no-no. Edward had taken Hilda and Ambrose to the side one day. While Zelda was in the library, nose deep in the latest book he had brought back for her. It was weeks after her confession of surviving a witch hunt. A bribe, a bridge to restore whatever his relationship with Diana had broken between them.</p><p>In a serious tone, Edward had confessed to both that Blackwood, once again, had asked Zelda’s hand and he had declined the offer as their parents had before, and Zelda was never to know about it. Zelda was far too powerful for Blackwood, and the High Priest feared the lengths his former mentor would go to tame her.</p><p>Hilda worried now because Edward could put an end to that relationship back then, but she wouldn’t. She was the little sister, and Zelda could and would kill her if she opposed it. If the tone her sister used, and the way she’d acted that morning was anything to go by… Hilda sighed. Her only remaining sibling was as stubborn as they came. The blonde knew there wouldn’t be a convincing her out of whatever thing Zelda was planning… and Hilda knew, it included Faustus Blackwood in their future.</p><p>“Satan helps us,” she mumbled as she entered the store, ready to start her day.</p><p>A few blocks away, Madam Satan was surprising students with her distracted demeanor and the soft smile plastered on her face. One that wasn’t quite like before, when she smiled at them timidly and they almost lost her facial expressions behind her mousey looks. Nothing quite like the one they were getting used to seeing, sharp, and mischievous. As if she knew something no one else knew. No, this one was as if… Ms. Wardwell was smitten?</p><p>Still, her reputation for the past months had stopped any students from commenting on it. No one wanted to get into the new Ms. Wardwell's bad side. The few that had… Well, no one wanted to end like that. Buried under enough homework to last a decade.</p><p>Not even Principal Hawthorne had managed to get her out of her cloud. He had approached her as he usually did, had stepped closer than necessary. Looking at him square in the eyes, she brushed past him, not even caring what the man was saying. The demoness hadn’t even felt the innuendo in his voice while being lost in her own little world.</p><p>Lunch was the end of Lilith’s out-of-body experience, to call it something. As she walked around the demoness had spotted the Putnam and the Walker girls. That had landed her right back into her mission. Sabrina. No matter how she knew they were on the waiting period of the necromancy spell, the demoness couldn’t approach the teen. Not yet, that would be too suspicious.</p><p>She sighed. Even she had to admit the girl was smart. It would serve her good too, Lilith’s position in the Hell’s Aristocracy and the power balance, needed someone who could be cunning. Her intelligence had always helped her when the demons, warlocks, and mortals, she was often left dealt with were never the brightest bulb in the lot. They often neglected everything while thinking they had the right to claim anything they wanted because they were male.</p><p>Lilith thought about her predicament between classes and chuckled at how different this assignment the Dark Lord had dropped on her shoulders was from anything she had done before. The demoness was about to start her last period of the day when she felt it. A mix of arousal, too soft to be annoying. Then it got worse. Madam Satan could swear she was feeling soft lashes hitting her back. She rushed to the teacher’s bathroom, fearing the worst. That it was her Master’s punishment for what she was yet to achieve.</p><p>Locking the door behind her, she got rid of the blouse she was wearing, “Oh, heavens. At least I had a good idea going for this blouse,” Lilith thought as she turned her back to the mirror. Eyes closed, not wanting to see what surely were red marks polluting her back. In the darkness of her closed lids, Lilith saw Zelda Spellman’s face vividly. </p><p>Another lashing-like feeling burned her skin, and she couldn’t take the doubt anymore. Opening her eyes, Lilith found the unmarred skin of her back. There was no signal of a devil’s claw, no burning marks, no swollen bits, or broken skin resulting from being on the receiving end of leather brutally slapped against the same part of her skin. The demoness shuddered, taking deep breaths to control herself.</p><p>It wasn’t her. It wasn’t happening to her.</p><p>If the half arousal humming in her blood was something to go by, the Spellman witch was half enjoying whatever the heavens she was doing. Until she felt it again. Pain consumed the arousal, leaving no trace of it behind. Betrayal boiled in her blood. Agony hummed from the witch’s power. Yet, the lashings had stopped.</p><p>“What the heavens are you playing at, Zelda?”</p><p>The entire ordeal was over faster than she thought it would. Yet, the demoness felt the need to splash water over her racing heart. Her nerves frayed. She wouldn’t allow this to control her. She had many lifetimes of brutal experience from the hands of the Dark Lord himself. Lilith would get rid of this, whatever it took. If she had to kill Zelda Spellman to stop this, so be it. So, after getting back to her classroom and finally finishing the day. Lilith was ready to start her research.</p><p>Yes, she was alive almost since the beginning of times. Her knowledge was extensive. Her experiences were even vaster. However, this connection wasn’t something she had ever heard about. Where could she find books about what she needed? She knew all the ones she owned by heart.</p><p>Her eyes lightened up. “The Academy of the Unseen Arts, of course.”</p><p>It was there, where she had ended up that night. Lurking in the shades. As she assumed it would, the library was deserted. Lilith walked around rows of bookshelves until she reached the most obscure area available. It was behind a lock, of course. She wanted to roll her eyes at this futile attempt to stop someone from her knowledge. Yet, she truly had understood the need. Honestly, no one wanted ill-prepared students–Like Sabrina Spellman and her chums- playing with the books she found behind closed doors.</p><p>As a safety method, she locked herself inside the room, placing an added spell to keep the lock from opening while she was inside. Perusing the titles, she picked up a few and took them to one of the two desks, at the end of the room. There always was something in the smell of old books that she’d loved. Nose deep into one tome, she felt her blood humming loudly. In that same way that it had when the demoness had entered the Spellman’s mortuary grounds.</p><p>Her blood announcing to her that Zelda was near.</p><p>Lilith smiled, basking in the feeling for a second. She knew the redhead must have felt her near the moment the demoness did. Madam Satan knew she should get out of the Academy and she was about to when it happened again.</p><p>“Oh, fake lord be damned!” She hissed when the whipping-like feelings burned her skin again. Lilith found with surprise that she quite liked the way Zelda’s arousal heated her blood. While the lashes brought forth memories, she thought contained and forgotten. Clenching her jaw, she stopped from screeching and bursting the whole damn place to ashes as they grew in number and strength. Suddenly, it stopped. Then, barely giving her time to breathe, the pain, the agony, and the betrayal followed suit.</p><p>No one would see her where she was. She could cry, swear, break and no one would be the wiser. Yet, the lashing wasn’t physically happening to her. Lilith had an inkling of what was going on. “Blackwood,” she thought. So, deciding to give herself and the redhead a break into this painful whatever Zelda Spellman was dragging them. She made herself comfortable on the ground and continued what Zelda had started.</p><p>Taking pleasure for her own when her body was in agony, wasn’t that hard for the demoness. Not when she had endured worse. Lilith concentrated on herself first. Caressing herself slowly, loving the way her own trimmed nails could bring goosebumps on her skin. It was working, she noticed. Arousal coming from Zelda’s remnants replaced the pain under her skin. The betrayal, however, hung there looming. No matter how relaxed and randy she was, or how Zelda's throbbing powers made her feel much more.</p><p>Feeling oddly proud of herself, Lilith felt the redhead witch coming undone. Zelda’s ecstasy raising the demoness to new rapturous levels of ecstasy, and soon, she too had crossed the bridge. Panting lightly, Lilith decided she needed to face Zelda. If only stop her from doing whatever it was causing the redhead’s agony.</p><p>Pain, the demoness could bear, but that feeling of betrayal mixed with something quite akin to self-loathe was getting her weak. Boiling her rage…</p><p>Everyone knew that a raging Lilith wasn’t something to be played with. Whatever the outcome, at least Zelda Spellman would be forced to reckon she wasn’t suffering alone. </p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Sorry, it took so long. I had quite a busy weekend.<br/>This chapter also forced me to take some 'do I want this?' decisions xD</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Chapter 10</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>To avoid any confusion... this one picks up right where we left Zelda back in Chapter 8. :)<br/>Enjoy.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Zelda understood Ambrose better than he thought she could. Even when his stay under their shared roof was forced, and hers had been volunteered for years now. Since her prodigal return, the redhead’s outings had consisted of attending Black Mass and any events related to the Church of the Night. Driving the hearse to whatever burial ground. The occasional visit to the market, in those rare occasions when Hilda couldn’t, and every other decade when Zelda was certain no one would wonder how was it she hadn’t aged a day, if not at all.</p><p>While Edward was alive, he had kept Zelda somewhat busy as a teacher in the Academy of Unseen Arts.  He had dumped on her Ancient Tongues, Latin, and demonology. Her brother had asked her to fill his spot in the many times he was gone. Teaching Sacred Scripture and a class he called History of the Occult.</p><p>Edward had pushed her for teaching more complex subjects. Ones that would show the extent of her skills and powers. The eldest Spellman wanted to take advantage of the subjects she’d mastered at a younger age than he had. Wielding it with ease, he had seen no other witch or warlock command. Conjuration, necromancy, and alchemy, where the lesser ones of those options. He’d offered to his sister, the classes only the greatest ones could transmit from mouth to ear to the younger generations. Despite her pride and how he had pointed it would help to make the Spellman’s name even greater, she had never acquiesced. After Edward pried out Zelda’s reasons, he apologized and never asked for more than she dared to give.</p><p>Truth was, she had enjoyed her time teaching. Her students loved her as much as they feared her, and Edward loved to mock her for it. Once he was gone, she couldn’t stand being there. It reminded her too much of her loss. Zelda Spellman never felt weak, although she pretended to be. She did feel unsafe without Edward to protect her, had she ever lost her tightly woven self-control.</p><p>With his passing, Zelda reckoned she was at risk at the Academy. The fact that her brother’s daughter had ended up under her care, had helped excuse herself from her duties at the Academy. It left the redhead to wonder if Edward had chosen her (and Hilda) to keep Sabrina safe, to protect her too. Giving her an excuse for her self-made seclusion.</p><p>Still buzzing with the afterglow bliss of her night with herself and the pulsating energy of Ms. Wardwell, Zelda had knocked on Ambrose’s doors.</p><p> “Auntie Zee?” He groaned, rubbing his eyes tiredly. Checking his watch, he groaned. It wasn’t by far his waking-up time. “What’s wrong?”</p><p>“Ambrose, can you get ready to start the day?”</p><p>“Sure?”</p><p>“Meet me downstairs when you are ready. I’ll fix you up with some breakfast and we’ll talk.”</p><p>“Auntie Zee… are you sure everything is okay?”</p><p>“We’ll talk once Hilda goes to work,” she finished closing the door behind her.</p><p>She walked to the kitchen and whipped up some breakfast for Ambrose. Sabrina had already left, and Hilda should be going soon. It was just Zelda’s luck that her sister stepped into the kitchen the moment she felt her blood humming with the brunette witch’s passion.</p><p>‘Damn this witch!’ the redhead thought, trying to keep herself composed. She felt irked at the way Hilda looked at her, bewildered, before walking out. Zelda’s legs weakened at their own volition and she forced herself to bite her hand when her body covered itself with goosebumps and a light current ran from head to toe. The brunette surely had reached her climax, bringing Zelda gently along for the trip.</p><p>Ambrose found her like that, biting her own hand with her head lowered. Slightly panting and looking disheveled. Cheeks burning red and chest flushed.</p><p>“Are you all right, Auntie?”</p><p>“Yes…” she breathed out. “I need your help, Ambrose.”</p><p>“My help?” He asked dumbfounded.</p><p>Not that much longer until they were sitting at the Spellman’s library. Ambrose looking at her as if she had grown another head. She had just explained to her nephew the little she knew. About her doubts with Father Blackwood’s current interest in the Spellman’s. About that word, Zelda was just calling a hex now. About the power exchange during the exorcism. About the humming under her skin. She kept to herself how she could feel more than just the low vibration of the brunette’s witch power and that there were other things shared between them too. If she was honest, it was a lot to take in.</p><p>“And you don’t know how they all tie in?”</p><p>“No. I’ve been racking my head trying to find what’s wrong. The meaning of the word, or any clue as to where this thing comes up, or why it happened with that schoolmarm of all the witches. I’m certain there’s nothing in this library about any of it. However, I need your help to keep searching.”</p><p>“I’m flattered, Auntie. However, if you couldn’t find anything or can’t remember anything about something as unique as this sounds, how could I?”</p><p>“In a few days, I will secure myself a position at the Academy. I will smuggle books for both of us. I understand you might be able to commute your sentence too. If that happens, you too will have access to the Academy’s library.”</p><p>“Have you thought about asking her?” Ambrose inquired. The way Zelda straightened her back told him all he needed to know. She was too proud to ask Ms. Wardwell what she knew.  “Mamihlapinatapai,” He tried the word. “Do we even know how it is written?” Zelda stretched forward and gave him a paper.</p><p>“I wrote some variations of how it could look, at least. Father Blackwood was coming over today?” Ambrose nodded. “We will know more about how to proceed by the time he leaves then.”</p><p>If there’s something Zelda Spellman wasn’t, was a prude. In her long years, she had her fair share of… Everything. Just like she had learned to master the art of war, strategy, and languages… Zelda had plenty of mastery in the Art of Seducing.  She’d felt a bit out of touch with that side of herself when Faustus had declined her kiss. She almost smirked when he offered her “penance”.</p><p>It was exhilarating having so much authority over her High Priest. To whip his back with as much force as she could muster, careful not to add the brunt of her magic over it. There was something erotic on having so much power over him, but thirty lashes went by swiftly on her hands and not rapidly enough on his.</p><p>Days earlier and unknowingly even to herself, she had planted the “poor sister Zelda” card in his mind. Now, it was time to capitalize it. So, when she gasped for air at the penultimate lash. The redhead let out a stream of confessions. Her envy of Constance Blackwood, carrying his children. Teaching even when she was that far along. When Faustus last hit was not as harsh as expected, Zelda knew he had fallen for her confession.</p><p>The cat O’nine tales fell on Hilda’s bed, and her skirt was violently pulled up. He didn’t give her time to think or to agree. Zelda reminded herself she supposedly was this wanton witch with a thirst for power. His bitch if he wanted to. So, she bit her lip and held her breath as he pounded on her. Until his body collapsed on top of her abused back.</p><p>“Meet me in two hours at the Academy’s dungeons.” He whispered in her ear, grasping her hair violently and kissing her harshly.</p><p>There was a knowing glint on Ambrose’s expression when they met in the parlor after Faustus left. He didn’t comment on whatever his auntie did to convince Blackwood. “He offered me to commute my sentence,” he stated as she took a drag of her recently found cigarette.</p><p>“I fear the worse, Ambrose. My intuition tells me there’s something bigger at play. It was too fortuitous that the killed warlock had found his way to our mortuary. Then his family killed themselves… And now…. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that you’ll be able to get out of here but…”</p><p>“Yes… I feel the oddity of it too, Auntie. Shouldn’t we tell Aunt Hilda and Sabrina? Maybe they have some ideas?”</p><p>“No, Ambrose. Whatever it’s brewing… I feel it’s too dangerous. If it wasn’t for Faustus reaching out for you, I wouldn’t even ask for your help.”</p><p>“Have you secured your position at the Academy, Auntie?” Zelda shuddered. She wasn’t looking forward to walking to the Academy as something other than Sabrina’s guardian.</p><p>“I’ll do it in an hour.”</p><p>The redhead wasn’t expecting to feel the humming of Ms. Wardwell’s power at the Academy when she entered the building. ‘What is she doing here? How did she enter?’ Zelda wondered. ‘Edward,’ she rolled her eyes. Whatever that annoying creature was doing at the Academy wouldn’t deter the ginger from getting what she came to claim. No matter how painful it would be, or how marred her back would end.</p><p>Once again, Faustus hadn’t given her a breather. Her previous power inebriated state led the way to the pain-based arousal state. Both flew out of the window the moment his hands pushed her skirt out of the way, sobering her up and tensing her for what was about to come.</p><p>It surprised her to feel the answer to her pain in the form of waves, after wave of light pleasure building up under her skin. It made Blackwood’s brutalizing act bearable. It was the thought of the witch was touching herself somewhere inside the Academy, most likely as an answer to her previous arousal, and it brought Zelda over, to her first climax reached along with Faustus.</p><p>She felt sick. Disgusting. Yet, she was familiar with those feelings.</p><p>At least, there was a reason behind them now. Her family. Her own peace of mind. Whatever it was happening, she could try to figure out from her newly gained teaching spot. She would get access to the library, find out more about the power exchange she and the Wardwell witch had experienced. Hopefully, she would figure out once and for all the meaning of that damned word.</p><p>Two hours after arriving to Gehenna Station, Zelda Spellman proved herself right. Men, no matter how intelligent or witted or cunning they thought they were, could always be surpassed by any woman. If the woman took into consideration that they wouldn’t ever think a mousey, wanting plaything could play them as she could.</p><p>Zelda was about to enter her home, in a search for a much-needed healing time, when she felt her body phase-out.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Chapter 11</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“You,” Zelda said with less bite than she intended, the moment she felt herself wholly and grounded again. Her eyes widening for a second as soft hands grasped her securely by the elbows. For a second, she got lost in the bluest of the seas, lost in Ms. Wardwell’s eyes.</p><p>Embarrassingly, Zelda swayed. As a result of a mix of her magical transportation, blood loss, and exhaustion. Lilith’s arms encircled her, and the redhead couldn’t help the painful moan that left her lips as the brunette’s hands reached her back just where Faustus had hurt her the worst.</p><p>“Heavens be damned! I knew it,” Lilith hissed, dragging the Spellman woman to the closest furniture available. Not giving her a chance to do anything but comply and remove the jacket that was being carefully pushed away from her frame as they moved.</p><p>There was one obvious thing none said out loud, Zelda reckoned Lilith had felt, to some extent, exactly what she was doing before. Feeling ashamed, the redhead avoided eye contact at all costs. It wasn’t hard either. The mother of demons had turned the ginger around. Pulling her blouse up and out of the way, grimacing at the state of the skin underneath it. Immediately, she sat behind Zelda to put into work one of Lilith’s most practiced spells... Healing skin.</p><p>To add to Zelda’s chagrin, of being found hurt and weak in front of a woman she barely knew, a soft moan had escaped half-parted lips the moment hot hands touched the damaged flesh of her back stitching wounds back together with a warm effort. The humming under her skin grew tenfold, reminding her of the fizzing of pouring carbonated drinks into a glass. It was comforting. Zelda couldn’t help but close her eyes and bask in the feeling. Behind her, Lilith gasped, not quite able to describe, even to herself, the strangest of the feelings. One that was running rampant throughout her veins.</p><p>“Stop…” Zelda whispered, barely finding her voice, not really meaning it. The warm, still and sure hands previously working to heal her back had been separated from her skin. It was enough to let her breath, to try to keep her heart from beating out from her chest. It left her desperate for getting more. Like a drug, Zelda wanted her. This schoolmarm had brought her over, carried her through time and space to this precise moment. The Spellman matriarch couldn’t help to raise her walls and wonder why. Why her? Why now? The more strategy-prone part of her mind, willing her body to cooperate with her.</p><p>She stood up. Goosebumps covered the length of her skin and she embraced herself by the middle to keep the warmth (the bubbly feeling) inside her, even if it didn’t go away nor had it dimmed with such a small distance between them. “Why am I here?”</p><p>“I need you to stop hurting yourself,” Lilith stated. “No matter how delectable you find it.”</p><p>“I’m not hurting myself.” Zelda defended herself.</p><p>“Then tell <em>him</em> to stop hurting you.”</p><p>“Him?”</p><p>“Are you really playing this dumb redhead card with me, Ms. Spellman?” Lilith raised her eyebrow and sighed dramatically. Letting her frame fall gracefully back into the sofa. The demoness raised her eyes to confused green’s and wished she could take away some doubts she saw swimming in there, but she couldn’t. She had wasted precious time keeping herself together. The last experience of Zelda’s brute sexuality, or whatever it was, had left her bursting at the seams. “I’ll be blunt, Ms. Spellman.”</p><p>“Zelda.”</p><p>“Zelda,” Lilith tasted the name in her mouth, and she felt some surprise at how it felt coming out from her mouth when the woman was in the room. How calling her name had the redhead holding her breath. The mother of demons kept that information to herself, though. She didn’t want to scare or embarrass the witch more than she already had.  “We both know there’s a situation involving remnants of our mingled powers, since the exorcism, and although, I would’ve love to give you a plethora of information about why, how, or what happened… I don’t have it. I’m blind as a bat in that front. However, I can be blunt enough to tell you that whatever exacerbated feeling you are enjoying, or not, I can feel it. So, I’ll ask again to please stop hurting yourself.”</p><p>“Why do you let him do it?” Lilith asked out of the blue. She knew why she had let Lucifer hurt her. The demoness knew how much it had cost her, and how much she was still paying for bowing to him all those millennia ago. What once was a thrill, now it only was suffering. There was only a remaining thread of her blind hope. Hanging from a crown that seemed near enough to be finally grasped by her.</p><p>The redhead stood still. Assessing the brunette until she decided that, in a worst-case scenario, she’ll make a fool of herself and the schoolmarm wouldn’t be able to prove so to anyone else. Or, she might gain a powerful ally in this game.</p><p>“He is the only one who can help me,” Zelda confessed, allowing herself to fall into the high-backed chair and feeling utterly thankful when her back didn’t hurt nearly as bad.</p><p>“You long to become the High Priestess,” Lilith stated, but there was more to it and she knew it.  The demoness had felt the extent of Zelda’s power, and she was certain Zelda had felt the extent of hers. “Do not negate it. I can read it in your stance. It’s not a mild desire, it could be more than a dream for you, and you know this.  We know this.”</p><p>Irked by being read so easily, she folded. “Why am I here? Truly. I’m quite certain you enjoyed part of my activities too.”</p><p>“I would’ve if we weren’t been left to deal with the aftermath of… that… If pleasure was the reward, I wouldn’t have any complaints as to what you do or how you do it, Zelda.” Lilith’s frankness stunned Zelda, but she respected that. So, they sat in silent companionship for a while.</p><p>“Did you hex me?” The redhead asked after a while, surprising herself with her question. Lilith snorted. Hexes were a silly little thing for witches of their like. She was certain Zelda carried enough protections around her for her to even try to break them. Transporting her had proven her so.</p><p>“I do not need to hex you, or any of your family members. Besides, as things stand, you’d know if I had.” As her words left the teacher’s mouth, Zelda nodded. She wanted to blame it on a hex, but it would be foolish to do so. There was more to it, to this thing they had. More than a hex, or a curse. Feeling the need for a nicotine rush, Zelda patted herself, finding herself still naked from the waist up. Searching for her discarded jacket, the redhead fetched her cigarette box and holder from one pocket. “Do you mind?”</p><p>“Not if you share,” Lilith grinned. It’d been ages since she had indulged into this vice, but it seemed fitting to reacquaint herself with it under the redhead’s smoldering gaze. With a flick of fingers, both were inhaling the calming poison of nicotine.</p><p>“And that word?” Zelda dared, after letting out some smoke. “The one you said when I found you at the Mortuary?” Lilith grinned, figuring out that it had bothered her.</p><p>“It’s just a word I’ve learned eons ago.” She dismissed with a wave of her hand. “It’s nothing of importance.”</p><p>“It’s not from any language I’m cognizant of,” Zelda stated. Feeling awfully dumb for having to ask it. She hated not knowing things, and her gut clenched with the inferiority feeling her father had ingrained into her.</p><p>“I’ll be surprised if you did. There’s only one person alive who still speaks it, and that’s not me.”</p><p>“It’s a mortal’s language?”</p><p>“Yes. It’s a very succinct word, that I happened to remember that night. It really is not of consequence,” she waved off. “Will you stop hurting yourself?”</p><p>“I can’t.” Lilith rolled her eyes.</p><p>“What could he possibly help you with? Besides making you the High Priestess. But for that, you must get rid of the pesky pregnant wife.”</p><p>“Sabrina.” Zelda sighed. Why she felt compelled to tell her anything? She wondered.</p><p>“Lovely kid. You did an amazing job raising her. She’s such a force to be reckoned with. Smart and brave that little thing,” Lilith said noticing she was telling the truth for once. “What is it with Sabrina?”</p><p>“It’s not only Sabrina.” Zelda sighed, lowering her eyes. “It’s everything… I can’t… I don’t trust you. I know deep down that you could be a formidable ally, but how could you be if I can’t trust you.”</p><p>Lilith sighed. It would be difficult to convince Zelda to trust her when the very basis of her existence in Greendale was a lie. She could try to force the woman to speak, but that would only make things worse. “Get dress. I’ll send you home.” The mother of demons whispered, half defeated.</p><p>The moment Zelda had stood up searching for her discarded blouse, Lilith had risen too. As if the redhead's skin was calling her to touch it, to heal it. The demoness found herself enthralled by the wounds that remained. “Let me heal those for you. Let me finish what I’ve started…” The brunette whispered, her voice low and hoarse.</p><p>Zelda stood up straight, her own skin craving for the warm hands she’d forced away earlier. Underneath it all, their powers were creating havoc, and it was a wonder how they could’ve talked at all for this long. Unable to utter a word now with the tension growing by each passing second, the redhead nodded once.</p><p>She hoped for the typical sounds of heels over the carpet, but she heard nothing but the growing fizzling of her and Ms. Wardwell’s magic. Not only the part already mixed up was boiling, but the one weaving anew was also humming loudly in their ears. Zelda gasped the moment a soft hand moved her hair away, unblocking the view of her barren shoulders.</p><p>Tentative hands were placed again on the length of skin that still showed the effects of Faustus brutality. Although some had disappeared in her previous attempt, there were still red raised bumps and thin lines that be them any mortal would surely scar.</p><p>Biting her lip at the moan that left Zelda’s mouth. She brought the redhead closer, Lilith’s hands embracing her loosely by the middle. Without a single thought left in her mind, the mother of demons kissed the tempting white column of Zelda’s neck.</p><p>“What…” the Spellman woman gasped, but she felt the wounds healing faster, almost at the speed of her racing heart. Zelda let out soft noises that Lilith couldn’t get enough of, and the redhead hadn’t stopped her from obtaining them either. The demoness whimpered when she found there were no remaining wounds to justify her actions. Still, she kissed her way up, stopping just about where she’d started.</p><p>“Good as new,” she whispered in Zelda’s ear. As if in a trance, the Spellman witch turned around. She found Ms. Wardwell’s blues almost fully dilated, and teeth biting on a naked lower lip. This need to suckle such a fine-looking lip took over Zelda. Carefully, as the other woman had treated her, the ginger raised her hand and caressed defined cheekbones first. Until her thumbs touched soft lips.</p><p>Green orbs met blue’s searching for permission that was granted with a surprised “oh,” and a quick nod. Then… blissful ecstasy. Lips were soft against one another. A tongue came out, tracing the curve of one lip. The other one answered in kind. Mouths parted, fighting over and welcoming the intrusion, as tongues searched every crevice, learning each other. Their power fizzling around them, engulfing them in their own little world.</p><p>They broke the kiss, still panting and flushed. Wanting for more.</p><p>“You should dress and go. I can’t promise I’ll resist you, Zelda,” Lilith whispered.</p><p>“And if I don’t want you to resist, Ms. Wardwell?” She countered playfully, and that did it. The demoness chuckled.</p><p>“You can’t even use my name, Zelda. Besides, we ought to admit this is, by far, the longest we’ve been in the same room since we met. I…” she trailed off. ‘I fear you might be at risk if we give in to this. The Dark Lord is a jealous one,’  Lilith thought. “You could start by calling me Mary,” she offered.</p><p>“We’ll see each other again, then,” Zelda said. Then, surprising them both, she smiled. “Mary.” She left a peck on swollen lips before she willed herself home.</p><p>Had Lilith walked her outside, they would’ve seen the flowers and exotic plants that had appeared lush in between the snow with no apparent explanation at all. But Lilith had only dropped herself to the sofa as Zelda magicked herself away.</p>
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<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Chapter 12</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The next morning, finds Sabrina returning the Book of the Death to Lilith’s library. It had been easy for the demoness to notice the spring on the teen’s steps, for surely she’d been proud of herself. To have defeated death, Madam Satan rolled her eyes at the impossible child. Grinning inwardly at the loop Sabrina had found since it had satisfied her. It would help her push the sweet thing yet another step down to fulfill the prophecy.</p><p>With the knowledge of what had happened and the myriad of possible consequences, Lilith couldn’t help but question the girl. Pretending to be unknowing and innocent, playing with the girl a little. It was not so fun when there was too much at stake that the teen could still find creative ways to send everything to heaven.</p><p>There were still pending miracles, not to dwell on her signature lacking on the dotted line. Lilith tried to focus on the child’s future, but she found herself drifting to the previous night. To that heated kiss. Longing for the way, her body hummed a distinct branch of magic under soft caresses. Something she had never felt before simmering under her skin.</p><p>It was Stolas, who brought her attention back to the mortal world, and Lilith went about her day, grading boring paperwork and teaching lies about events she had helped happen back in the time. “Ms. Wardwell? Do witches really exist?” One of her youngest students asked her, and she had to stop herself from answering the truth.</p><p>“What do you think, Miss Jones?” She saved herself from answering by instilling a debate about it. Almost giving herself a pat on the back for having done so. Almost, because now she would’ve to sit and read whatever inaccurate information about witches her class could gather.</p><p>Amid all the things already going on in her mind, there was that distracting new brand of jittery energy she could feel coming from Zelda Spellman. Intrigued by this, she dispatched Stolas to check up on the family, finding the mortuary completely empty. Following her instincts, she redirected her familiar to the Academy and surely, the raven-demon confirmed it. He found the redhead and her nephew there. Lilith couldn’t help but wonder not only what the redhead had planned to get or learn under the cost of her brutal sacrifice, and what were Blackwood’s plans? Why had he granted the Spellman boy his return to the school?</p><p>“What to do?” She asked to her empty office. Out of a sudden, she was holding back a groan when the first burning of a lash seared her shoulder. “Zelda…” She hissed.</p><p>There was nothing Lilith could do about it now, other than to walk to her classroom and continue her day. That made her anger grow tenfold. She wanted to burn something, and she had to be careful not to set the whole damn town ablaze. As she thought she would finally give in, and maybe burn the tree outside her window, it stopped. There was no more pain, no betrayal, no anything else that she had come to expect from these… sessions of Zelda’s. Had someone caught them? She wondered.</p><p>Back at the Academy, Zelda groaned as a knock on Faustus' door had stopped them from continuing their power game. It couldn’t have been better planned. When Ambrose entered the room, he barely crossed gazes with his auntie. </p><p>“Father Blackwood, I was just wondering… I know what you’ve asked of me. However, I’ll need to know the limitations of my access to the library.”  Zelda barely held her smirk at this.</p><p>“You have all the access you need, Ambrose,” Faustus waved him to take a seat. The redhead nodded towards the door and the High Priest waved her free.</p><p>Thanking the distraction, the witch rushed to the library herself, going straight to the most obscure part of it. She would need to investigate further in mortal languages to figure out that pesky word. However, the mingling of powers was still a mystery, and seemingly the one thing Sabrina's teacher pretended not to know. Zelda got lost in the books, as she usually did. Until it was too damn late.</p><p>Rushing along the corridors, and into the desecrated church, she grabbed one of the song booklets from the pile that two of the Weird Sisters carried. Perusing the pages quickly, she found the most absurd and soft song available in the options. One of Hilda’s favorites. One she herself had hated, but it would show her ‘soft’ and ‘weak’ side. Besides, as ridiculous as it sounded to her ears, it helped to vocalize.</p><p>Zelda felt the hairs at the nape stand up the moment Faustus entered the room. He was sizing her, and she knew it. She felt the need to sing if only to show just 'how invested she was in it', and then between the silly wordings of Do-Re-Mi, it happened. The next nail on the coffin of the Spellman’s name, hammered in place by Sabrina Spellman herself.</p><p>Green eyes widened in concern. She needed to get to her niece; she needed to avoid Faustus getting to her first. Zelda knew him, and he wouldn’t doubt to kill Sabrina. The Spellman matriarch was boiling with rage and worry. In her cottage in the woods, Lilith was struggling with these powerful emotions that didn’t belong to her.</p><p>When the redhead transported herself to the mortuary, irritation turned into blind agony. She was the only one in the household who didn’t know. They all chose to let her in the dark, afraid of how she would react. Both adults had valid reasons, too and she would dwell on them later. Now she needed to face her niece and kill Thomas Kinkle’s soulless body to restore the balance her reckless charge had disturbed.</p><p>The moment the teen entered the house, Zelda had burst. She had lied to Sabrina, hiding behind her harsh words that she was only trying to save her. From Faustus. From pain. From being discovered and burned at the stake as she herself was before. If Sabrina was discovered, then it was no doubt they would all be.  The memory of flames licking her skin, charring her while mortals, and later warlocks, watched that happening as they laughed at her. Her most excruciating memories fueled her protective streak.</p><p>But even that had a limit, and Sabrina had proven to be just as stubborn as the eldest Spellman was.</p><p>It dawned on her that it was all her fault. Sabrina after all was too damn like Zelda herself had been. Her guilt was most likely what kept her from bawling her eyes out amidst their discussion. When Sabrina told her she wasn’t her mother. When she dared to call her ‘Zelda’ as if she hadn’t given her everything into raising the petulant child. It didn’t take Hilda’s intervention to keep her from slapping her niece until her head turned around. Or to have to bury the child into their Cain pit as she did many times with her sister when this irate. If only because she found a reflection of herself on the young blonde. Her charge, she raised her… It was all her fault.</p><p>Sabrina was a full witch now. It was the time that she learned the lessons Zelda had been afraid to let her live through. The redhead walked away proudly, not showing how she was scarcely holding the pieces of herself together. Once alone, the eldest Spellman pressed her battered heart, wishing things would’ve been different. Wishing she was the one who had died on a plane, or better yet, wasn’t saved from the heat of the fire that had been so close to consuming her whole.</p><p>It had been so easy to collect the whip from the place she had hidden it after her afternoon with Faustus. It had been so natural to let her clothes fall and hurt herself. She could feel the humming of Ms. Wardwell. No… Mary’s powers under her skin. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, knowing she was failing the other witch too. Then the first hit reached her skin. She wasn’t as strong as Faustus, but she could feel the pain washing over her, cleansing her.</p><p>When ghostly lashing traces burned her skin, Lilith couldn’t take it anymore. The redhead knew she could feel her pain by now. Why was she still doing it? She was about to recall her to the cottage when the doorbell went off.</p><p>Once upon a time, Lilith thought a well-placed lash could be nice and erotic. Truth was, now they were triggering old memories and pains she thought buried a long time ago. The thing that was making it all worse was that she could feel not only the marks burning her skin but also Zelda’s most well-kept secret. The self-loathing buried underneath it all. One feeling Lilith knew all too well.</p><p>Empathy, when you felt the same before yourself, was such a simple thing to do, the first witch came to understand by then. Keeping herself together in front of Sabrina, while her aunt and herself were experiencing this connection while both were breaking at the seams, was proving harder than she thought it could be. Being regarded as a strong woman was not as pretty as some people painted it. It usually came with hidden anguish and a top-notch skill to keep feelings and self-doubts, all under wraps.</p><p>“Are you sure you are all right, Ms. Wardwell?” Lilith had to give it to the blonde teen. She really cared about everyone, and like most people she’d met with that trait, the demoness knew that would cause Sabrina’s downfall. “Yes. You mustn’t worry about me, Sabrina. I can very well take care of myself,” She dismissed showing her the door.</p><p>Thankful for the cover of night, Lilith walked the teen to the entryway to limbo. Her hands shook when she grabbed the wool that would show the girl to the door from the inside. Heavens forbid the girl got stuck in between the realms when there was so much to be done.</p><p>It was a reprieve to see her cross over, a time to screech for the pain she was no longer feeling burning her skin, but that was still too fresh underneath it; that was still sizzling with self-loathing. The first witch wanted to crawl on her bed or hide in Mary’s closet, but how stupid would that be? A demon as strong as she was hiding from something no one could ever hide from. She could control armies of mortal and demons. She could breed new demons and she'd had created her Lilins. As the first woman, she had survived millennia of punishments and victories, the sun always raised the next day no matter what had happened before… But not even she could escape the confines of her own mind.</p><p>Instead, she drowned her sorrows in cheap whisky and planned her next steps the moment she reached the cottage. She was taking too long, and every minute as Mary Wardwell was making her more susceptible to Zelda Spellman’s whips and those pesky little feelings. The Santa Diabla blew again, collecting what was owed and closing this chapter of Sabrina's life. </p><p>In the dead of the night, Stolas cawed as Zelda grasped her niece in a fierce embrace, trying to pick up her niece's pieces together when she had failed to do the same for her own. In her cottage, the weird feeling bubbled again under Lilith's skin, making her gasp for air. Wondering if she too would feel this way encased in soft arms. </p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Chapter 13</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lilith survives days of Zelda’s antics. Now she fears going outside to face Greendale when at any moment she could want to crawl inside a hole to never leave. She knew what to do; yet, she was struggling not only with herself but with Zelda’s feelings underneath her skin.</p><p>It paralyzed her; however, she still allowed Zelda to live.</p><p>What’s a week or two when you’ve survived millennia as a handmaiden? Still, Lilith’s strength was thinning, and so was her patience. A couple of times during the past days, she had felt the betrayal burning down, tugging at the thing someone had dared to call a heart. The betrayal and the pain always came hand in hand, as if the redhead wasn’t really enjoying whatever she was doing.</p><p>The mother of demons, sex indulgent and all, wasn’t willing to think about exactly what could’ve been happening.  She knew what could be, but she wasn’t willing to risk questioning why. Out of a sudden, the erotic feeling always ended up becoming just agony and betrayal. Or why the Spellman matriarch wasn’t enjoying herself after being in such an erotic high.</p><p>It was late on a Friday night when she felt it. This time Lilith could feel her skin ripping apart with the strength of the whipping. She transported herself to the darkness of Father Blackwood’s office. She found them there.</p><p>Green eyes widened and a blush covered already bright pink cheeks when the humming under her skin became unbelievingly close. Zelda looked up to find Mary watching in her from the shades. Blue orbs didn’t waver from the redhead’s eyes. Not until the ginger was forced to close them while taking the pain stoically with lips being bitten so harshly that a drip of her blood fell to the floor. Opening her eyes for a brief second, she found the brunette shaking her head, disappointed. She vanished then.</p><p>Faustus collapsed atop Zelda’s back. She whimpered and the grandfather clock ticked away another wasted hour.</p><p>“I must return to the Mortuary,” she panted.</p><p>“Go ahead then,” Faustus groaned as he straightened his clothes, turning his back to her.</p><p>Zelda didn’t dwell on his actions, she fixed her clothes swiftly and not wanting him to know she could very well transport herself away without muttering an incantation. She took a deep breath. “Ianuae magicae.”</p><p>“Are you here to offer excuses? Or to apologize for having me whipped along with you?” Lilith inquired the moment the woman materialized, and the humming went loud in her ears.</p><p>“I won’t apologize for what I’m doing,” Zelda stated. She would not apologize to try to bring the Spellman’s name from whatever hole they had buried it since Sabrina’s dark baptism fiasco.</p><p>“Do you even know what you are doing? Do you understand the game you are playing, at all? Do you realize you are dragging me unwillingly along?” Lilith questioned while trying to rein over her emotions.</p><p>‘I shouldn’t do this,’ the demoness thought. Not with that damned thing burning her blood. Not when she felt the betrayal and now, she knew what it was all about. Lilith was far from stupid, she had seen what caused it. Even if the demoness didn’t quite understand why it worked that way. The mother of demons was certain she would feel the betrayal every time it wasn’t she the one intimately joined with the redhead.</p><p>“You don’t understand,” Zelda mumbled. Feeling Lilith's rage burning underneath her own. They were a nuclear facility waiting to be blown into pieces. With each word any available fire, be that the flames of the dozens of candles that littered the place, or the blazing one at the hearth, grew exponentially as if their rage fueled them. “It’s the Spellman name. It’s my niece. My sister. My nephew… You have no family, you wouldn’t understand. You wouldn’t understand what it’s like to sacrifice yourself to spare someone you love.”</p><p>“Oh, so now <em>I</em> don’t understand.” Lilith spat. Sure, as the first woman, she didn’t have any family as Zelda had. Then again, there was no one more apt to understand what it was like to throw oneself to the depths of pain to appease someone. She had become a demoness for someone! “Please enlighten me, how would you know what I do and don’t understand? You know nothing about me. If you must, I’m perfectly aware of what’s like to be punished while shouldering someone else’s guilt.” The redhead took a step back with that revelation. The mother of demons felt uneasy after letting out such a thought escape the confines of her most private memories. “Besides, it doesn’t matter if I do or don’t. Truth is, you aren’t helping yourself and you aren’t helping me!”</p><p>“So, this is about you,” Zelda hissed. The redhead didn’t know why, but she wanted to battle the woman until they ended up rolling together in a pit of burning passion. She was ashamed, too, of wanting nothing more than to embrace the brunette and hold her while they both cried out what their powers were confessing under their skins. The things both were terrified to admit out loud. The brokenness that made them both too damn alike to be such different creatures.</p><p>“Yes! Why shouldn’t it be? When I’m right there with you at the end of that whip. I’m right there with you when the excitement turns into agony! You know, Zelda, I would say you like this... this violence in your mating, but you don’t. If you did, it wouldn’t hurt me. I wouldn’t feel your unworthiness, your suffering, nor your pain. I wouldn’t feel anything more than the throes of your passion bubbling under my skin. But guess what? That goes out of the window the moment the whipping stops.”</p><p>Zelda’s eyes filled with tears that she wouldn’t allow to escape. Too embarrassed to be faced with a truth she wasn’t ready to confront. “Well, I’m sorry! I won’t stop living my life just because I can’t find a way to undo whatever you did to me that night”</p><p>“What I did to you?” Lilith snorted, raising her hands in frustration. “That’s rich! Well, excuse me, but while you are fucking around and getting us whipped. I, too, am trying to figure an out for this thing you did to me! Heavens! It’s not as if I’ve got the better end of the deal in this mess,” She huffed, plopping herself on the high-backed chair she often used. Surprising her, Zelda sat on the other available one. A pained groan escaped parted lips. A rush of her pain passing towards Lilith.</p><p>The demoness stood up, “Let me see,” she added, her voice low, tired but still commanding enough that left no room for question. Zelda did as she was asked. Standing up and turning around, the Spellman matriarch took her jacket off and turned around to expose the zipper of her dress. The demoness took the hint and lowered it. “Oh, Zelda…” Lilith sighed at the mess that was still lingering in the redhead’s back. “Why didn’t you heal them?”</p><p>“What’s the point? If they will open up again?” The redhead whispered as soft fingertips traced the oldest wounds. The mother of demons shuddered. She knew all too well that logic. Under her glamor, hundreds if not thousands of scars remained.</p><p>Healing warmth spread from Lilith’s fingers to Zelda’s back as the skin was created anew. The first witch’s hand moved upwards slowly, as if not to scare the trembling woman under her healing spell. The demoness moved rose gold hair away from marred skin and wondered what this witch would say if she ever saw Lilith’s real image. The one covered with similar wounds. Zelda sighed in content, her skin covered with goosebumps as the hands worked up and down repairing what would most likely end up broken again. As broken as they felt inside.</p><p>“You, too, don’t know what this is,” Zelda stated after a long while, turning her head slightly to watch Mary’s eyes focused on her back. Lilith shook her head. She took her hands away from the now healed skin.</p><p>“No… but please, stop this nonsense of getting beaten.” She whispered, helping Zelda with her dress. The redhead found her jacket and closed it tightly as if it could keep the teacher from knowing what she most likely already felt under her skin.</p><p>“I can’t,” Zelda whispered, an apologetic look on her face.</p><p>“Then I want an explanation” Lilith countered. The redhead clenched her jaw, but the brunette’s eyes didn't waver, nor did her resolve fade. She needed to understand what was happening in that head. “I think you owe me at least that.”</p><p>Green orbs focused on the blue ones. She saw a lot of things there. Among them, she recognized parts of herself too. Wounds she carried deeply hidden from anyone else to see, and now she saw reflected at her in similarly hidden hues. She sat back on the loveseat, pulling her cigarette case and offering it. Smoke filled the room, and there were only filters remaining when Zelda finally spoke, “It’s the only way I could think of that will cost them nothing. I’m the price to pay.”</p><p>“Them?” Lilith asked, already knowing the answer.</p><p>“My family.” </p><p>“You need to be less cryptic, Zelda.”</p><p>“The Spellman’s have fallen out of their height. My sister’s excommunicated. My nephew just commuted his sentence to work at the Academy. My niece… She’s set into breaking every rule there is. I’m responsible for them. I’m their matriarch. I’m the one who’s unable to keep them from failing… And I’m doing a terrible job at it. I’m failing them.”</p><p>“How does Father Blackwood fit in this grand plan of yours?”</p><p>“He’s the only one who can restore Hilda’s status inside the church. As he already did by commuting Ambrose’s sentence. I only need to keep him from murdering Sabrina the next time that child does something utterly wild. Faustus was always a man of multiple desires. I always knew what to give him and when to abstain. Giving in, it’s the best course of action at this point.”</p><p>“So, you won’t stop.” It wasn’t recriminating her. It was just a statement.</p><p>“Unless you have any greater ideas, as you seem to have whenever my niece and her need for breaking rules appear, then no. I won’t stop. Not until his boys are born, and he’s more concerned with them than to fight Sabrina’s every whim with the brunt of his power.”</p><p>“He fears her. Your niece threatens everything he stands for,” Lilith confessed.</p><p>“Then he’s even more of a fool than I’ve come to know.” Zelda shook her head. The demoness frowned in confusion for a bit. “How did you know to find me there?”</p><p>“Does it matter?”</p><p>“It matters if you’d stand on my way of retrieving the Spellman’s name luster to its glory. Beyond what he can do to help my quest, Faustus is of no consequence for me. Now, you on the other hand... I don’t want to have to face you. I’ve felt your power.” Lilith smiled, without a single thought in her mind but the need to close the space between them. She walked to Zelda and kissed her.</p><p>“Faustus Blackwood is a fool. He doesn’t know you at all. He doesn’t deserve you, and he won’t even acknowledge he’s afraid of the wrong Spellman,” the demoness whispered against half-parted lips.  She felt Zelda’s hands around her waist, and a second later she was being pulled flush against the redhead. With not enough room to land, Lilith straddled her. Blue eyes drowned in greens. “I’m afraid of you, Zelda. I’m afraid of this,” she confided.</p><p>Green orbs didn’t widen in surprise, as Zelda could feel the fear humming under her skin. The redhead was confident her next words wouldn’t come as a revelation either. “I’m terrified, too.”  She admitted, caressing sharp cheeks with her thumbs.</p><p>“Stay tonight…” Lilith asked. Her breath tickling Zelda’s lips. Her eyes closed as goosebumps raised on her skin with the soft touches coming from the bewitching ginger.</p><p>“Are you sure?”  The redhead wondered. After all, the last time it was Mary who had pushed her away.</p><p>The tickling of the brunette’s breath on Zelda’s lips was replaced with warm lips, coaxing hers to move accordingly, to explore any length. The humming in their blood telling them this was better than just right.</p><p>Lilith knew Zelda Spellman was a smart woman, and even if she hadn’t voiced an answer, the redhead had understood her clearly.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Chapter 14</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>As a demoness, Lilith was known as a very sexual being. As a witness and unwilling spectator of her passion, the mother of demons expected Zelda Spellman to be very candid with her sexuality, too. She imagined they both had said yes to a lot of things others wouldn’t. Except this, it seemed.</p><p>Lilith was feeling utterly vulnerable, with her emotions barely under control and exposed beyond the confines of her own body. Confused by the alien ones, throbbing under her skin.</p><p>Be this woman, any other person underneath her straddle, and whoever it was, would’ve been writhing with pleasure until Lilith had sated all the naughty ideas that came with her current predicament. Sitting with her legs pressed to the sides of the redhead, her own skirt riding up, barely covering her. The demoness found she hadn’t enough space to move or do much more than let her lips do the initial work. Sure, Madam Satan could’ve been with her hands all over the place, perhaps touching soft mounds and eliciting all sorts of sounds from a pliant body beneath hers. But she wasn’t…</p><p>She couldn’t.</p><p>Truth be told, Zelda considered herself a highly sexually liberated being, and she knew, for the way she was being kissed, that Mary Wardwell could look the part of a spinster but she certainly had the experience to drive anyone wild just with her warm, wet lips.</p><p>Having all the space to move, it was weird, to say the least, that she sat almost still. Enjoying the exchange of warm mouths. Be this any other person, and she would’ve had whoever it was, naked at least from the waist up. With her mouth working not only against lips but latching to any available piece of skin.</p><p>But no, she couldn’t.</p><p>The most daring thing the redhead had found herself doing so far, was placing one hand on that dark mane as Mary’s hand entangled with her own hair softly. Zelda’s other hand was keeping the brunette tightly pressed against her. The redhead noticed then that the blouse the teacher was wearing had ridden up slightly, and she couldn’t help but trace her fingertips over the naked and soft skin she found. Surprised by this new contact, Lilith gasped. Breaking the kiss and resting her forehead against Zelda’s.</p><p>Disentangling herself from the redhead, the mother of demons stood up and offered her hand to the tempting witch. The Spellman woman raised her eyes, confused by this offering. “You are staying…” Lilith stated before she bit her lip doubting now of that answer. “Right?”</p><p>Zelda wanted to answer yes, but she really didn’t want to move this thing further than they already had. It was barely the second time they saw each other in private, and while she wanted nothing more than to lie tangled and trembling along with this mysterious woman. Her last tryst with Faustus was still too fresh, and it would taint whatever beginning this could become. She frowned, ‘why would you even consider this as a beginning of anything?’ she wondered.</p><p>“No sex,” Lilith stated, as if she read the trepidation on Zelda’s face. Apprehension bubbling under her skin or not, the truth was she didn’t want to risk this thing by bedding Zelda and ruin any possibilities. ‘Possibilities of what? You are going to become the Queen of Hell once you finish grooming her niece to take your place. She doesn’t even know who you are!’ Lilith chastised herself. Still, there was something else that pushed her to say the next words until they left her mouth. “Just… stay… please?”</p><p>“Of course.” Zelda agreed too easily, and not a bit embarrassed at the desperate whispery-tone it came out in.</p><p>Suckling her lip, Lilith offered her hand again. This time, an almost translucent hand clasped her freckled one. With sure steps the demoness didn’t quite know how she was walking, she directed them upstairs to her room.  Blushing when she found them inside the bedroom only to realize one thing. Trepidation grew underneath her skin now, alerting the ginger that something was wrong.</p><p>“What’s the matter?” Zelda whispered, assessing her companion. She frowned in worry as her hand found the soft skin of Lilith’s cheek. “Hey, if you want me to go…” she whispered. The redhead knew it would pain her to leave, but if Mary asked her, she would. There wouldn’t be impositions on her part over the other woman. She was hurting her enough as things were.</p><p>“No! I mean…” Lilith shook her head, feeling stupidly vulnerable. She was a demoness, for hell’s sake! “I usually sleep naked, so I just figured… I don’t think I own something you can sleep on.” ‘Was that a blush what I felt in my cheeks?’ Lilith wondered.</p><p>Zelda wanted to laugh at this predicament. It was just outright silly that two adults over three hundred years old (and she was being really nice with her own age) could feel this shyness for something so mundane as sharing a bed. Yet, she understood the intricacies of what wasn’t being said. Sex was that, sex. Raw, free, and detached. Whereas this was vulnerable, intimate, and revealing. They were nothing more than mere acquaintances who happened to know more about each other than anyone else, thanks to the stupid shared magic that still ran rampant underneath their skins.</p><p>Without saying a word, half scared that by speaking she would finish spooking the usually cold and collected brunette, Zelda turned around and moved her hair out of the way. When there was no response to her action, she twisted her head to see if Ms. Wardwell would take the hint. “Help me?” she asked then, in a whisper when it seemed the brunette was oblivious to her current predicament.</p><p>As if she had just discovered the woman in her room, Lilith’s eyes widened for a second. A couple of uncertain steps later, and she was standing behind Zelda. Her hand found the zipper. Rolling it down smoothly, discovering the expanse of skin once again. The redhead moaned as a finger traced the outline of her spine. They both shuddered at once, the tension growing again between them.</p><p>“The-there’s an extra toothbrush underneath the sink. Feel free to use anything you’ll need from there.” Lilith said, pointing towards the door of her bathroom.</p><p>“Do you have… hm… clean underwear that I could borrow?” Zelda asked, blushing. The demoness frowned for a second, and then she remembered how this night had started. She quickly found one she thought could fit her and passed the ensemble to the waiting-woman.  “Thank you,” the redhead said, grabbing the items from pale hands and placing her own atop them.</p><p>“There’s a spare towel there too.” The mother of demons managed to say as she removed her hands softly from under cold ones. As Zelda disappeared into the en-suite, Lilith took a deep breath. Trying to collect her jittery energy only to realize it was impossible to do so because it wasn’t only hers.</p><p>“Praise… you,” the demoness mumbled the moment the door was opened, and an almost bare Zelda walked out of the bathroom. Not a touch of makeup on her skin, her hair braided loosely, her glorious body competing with the moonlight in its translucent glow.  There was only a scrap of fabric covering her, dark and tempting, and it was missing its top part. Lilith had to swallow hard to be able to breathe. “For hell’s sake you are gorgeous,” she let out and Zelda blushed. Pink splotches covering the skin of her chest, rushing up to tint her cheeks and the tip of her ears.</p><p>“Do you have a side?” She wondered, biting her lower lip and feeling utterly self-conscious.</p><p>“No, take the one you want,” Lilith whispered, still in awe. It was the glint in her eyes and the something bubbling underneath her skin that made Zelda feel precious. It was such an odd feeling for her. One she had never quite experienced before.  “I-I’m… I’ll be right back.”</p><p>Lilith came out of the bathroom moments later, wanting to slap herself for forgetting she owned robes. That would’ve taken the awkwardness from before. The demoness came to a halt when she noticed the redhead already comfortably lying on her bed. Her heart skipped a beat. The redhead was glorious against her black satin sheets and deep red comforter. Lilith suckled her lower lip when she noticed it was her reading glasses sitting on Zelda’s nose as she focused on a book (the one Lilith herself was reading).</p><p>The mother of demons considered herself as quite witted, but there was no way she could come up with something to say now. She must have had made some noise because green eyes landed on her. The demoness was conscious that her body was being discretely assessed and stood proud. The body the Dark Lord chose had aged comparing with the ones he usually chose, yet Lilith loved every inch of it. She couldn’t feel prouder when Zelda’s lips curved in approval moments later.</p><p>“I hope you don’t mind?” Zelda whispered. Her voice hoarse after examining the other woman so thoroughly.</p><p>“Huh?”</p><p>“The glasses? The book?” The redhead said, pushing the frame a bit upwards and showing her the book that sat before on her night table. Lilith shrugged and turned the room’s light off. Only two nightstand lamps and the moonlight illuminating the room now, making everything all the more intimate.</p><p>“Ah, I’m just surprised they work for you, and now you can rest assured that I, too, was doing some research.” Lilith shrugged it off. “Are you cold? Too warm? Do you need a glass of water?” She asked quickly, doubting about getting into the bed.</p><p>“Truly, if my presence in your bedroom makes you uncomfortable, I can go. I’m here because you asked me to stay. I’ll leave, no hurt feelings, if you ask me to go.” Zelda offered, moving across the bed to lower the book where she had found it, on the nightstand on the other side of the bed. Then, looking up to the other woman, the redhead offered a small uncertain smile, and then patted the space beside her. “I can turn my back to you?”</p><p>Chewing her lower lip, Lilith moved to the bed and tucked herself on her side. The sheets felt cool against her warmed skin and the comforter heavy enough to provide some more assurance, like a nest of sorts. The heat coming from the other woman was enthralling. Yet, what had warmed the demoness the most was that it was her choice. Zelda made it her choice. She would go or stay if that was what Lilith decided. That freedom was rare in the demoness’ books.</p><p>Feeling exposed, Lilith turned off the lamp on her nightstand first, curling to her side and far away enough from the tempting warmth. The darkness took over the room, and she felt the redhead shuffle. “Your glasses,” came Zelda’s voice, a little too close to her ears, and the brunette turned around to find out the redhead was lying on her side but facing her.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” Zelda let out again, once Lilith had placed the glasses safely in their place. The room was covered only in moonlight, enough light to let her know the other witch was with her back to her.</p><p>“What for?” Lilith asked curiously, turning around to watch her. It wasn’t like she could really read her expressions under the current light. It was enough to see her eyes were opened and feel her breathing close to her. Besides, she didn’t need to see her expressions when she could feel her emotions.</p><p>“That I can’t stop this from hurting you. You shouldn’t pay my price.” Zelda whispered. Her hand found Lilith’s face. Another soft caress traveled the demoness cheeks. Her lips parted once more before soft ones found them.</p><p>It was strange, they both thought, how after many partners in the years they’ve lived they had never felt this perfect. How they hadn’t felt this vulnerable, and this safe at the same time.</p><p>“Good night,” Zelda whispered, placing a last chaste kiss on swollen lips.</p><p>“Good night,” Lilith answered back.</p><p>Both finding astounding how easily they molded into each other. Arms loosely placed over waists, legs entangled, mingling breaths quieting into sleep, humming magic shared in their embrace, and they both thought just how weird it was, how perfectly they fit together.</p>
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<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Chapter 15</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>That night there had been no snores beside her bed, lulling her to sleep, nor sounds of footsteps on top of her ceiling before Ambrose finally settled in. There was no creaking of Sabrina’s bed as the teen tossed and turned as she usually did. Just complete silence and peace.</p><p>The first rays of sunlight filtered inside the room and did nothing to wake up the two sleeping beauties lay tangled under dark sheets. Lost in dreamland, they were utterly unaware of the passaging time around them. Cocooned in each other, they finally rested in a safety previously unknown to them both.</p><p>It was past midday when green eyes opened slightly, blurred with the weight of a dreamless night. A rarity for the usually concerned woman that solved most of her daily issues in her dreams, coming up with ideas of how to fix things and lately, with the sound of a whip against her back. With nightmares about Sabrina burning something, under the blue light of Hellfire, and in between them all, an image of Mary Wardwell tempting her into a healing embrace.</p><p>Beside her, blue eyes fluttered open, and the demoness had to admit that a dreamless night was beyond her expectations. She didn’t need to sleep that much, and whenever she did, her dreams would be nightmares, memories of her lows, ideas of ways she could be punished for eternity. Lately, not only Zelda’s image but the witch’s warmth surrounding her. Healing Lilith in a never-ending embrace.</p><p>The dreamless night both had experienced wasn’t without fate’s intervention. It was dreamless because they were traveling the astral plane together. Drowned in the love, the peace, and the equilibrium it was meant for them to bring. If they knew what had happened in there, they would end in a sea of agony once they took the steps into fulfilling their destiny. Things needed to happen, and their hearts needed to be broken. They needed to be fragmented. Only then, they could step up and fulfill what their fates needed them to, what was written for them.</p><p>Zelda blinked first. She had never felt this warm sharing a bed before. It was cold outside, and they had kicked the comforter away during the night. Yet, there was this heat, filling her body as if she wouldn’t ever need anything else but the woman beside her to survive. She noticed the blue eyes staring at her and smiled softly. Her hand rose at its own volition to move a strand of the hair away from covering her view of the blue pools.</p><p>The mother of demons shivered once coldish fingers moved away from the lock of hair that had covered her eyes. Zelda Spellman was so tender with Lilith, and it surprised her. Especially when the demoness had been a witness of the scratches on Blackwood’s back that she knew were caused by the Spellman currently on her bed. She had also known that the eldest Spellman was the tough hand in Sabrina’s life, supposedly cold, detached, and unaffected by the child’s antics. Soft was not something she would’ve ever used to describe the redhead before, yet here she was, cuddling up to this soft, caring woman and feeling precious, safe, cherished for once.</p><p>Biting her lower lip, the redhead doubted for a second before she made her choice. Moving forward slowly, she kissed tempting lips once more. Lazily claiming them. Hers being reclaimed in the same languorous way. They went on for what felt like an eternity and yet; it wasn’t nearly enough when they had to part to breathe.</p><p>“Good morning,” Zelda smiled. A timid yet breathtaking smile. Lilith’s heart skipped a beat. It was one of the most beautiful things she’d ever seen coming from the redhead.</p><p>“Delightful morning,” Lilith said. Pressing a chaste kiss on swollen lips. Surprising herself, the demoness snuggled closer to the other woman, searching for her heartbeat. Zelda sighed in content, pulling the lithe body as close as their curves allowed them. “I don’t want to wake up.” The teacher confessed in a whiny whisper.</p><p>“Neither do I…” Zelda sighed. However, something was nagging in the back of her mind. Maybe it was the way the sunlight shone against the mirror, blinding her for a second. Or maybe it was the raven cawing outside the window. A pained sigh later, she figured she should get home and see to fix whatever issue her disappearance could’ve brought upon her. “I should…”</p><p>“I know.” Lilith sighed and untangled herself from the warm body below her, feeling already bereft. “Let me fix you some breakfast, as you get ready.” She stood up and found a robe, binding it against her body.</p><p>“There’s no need…” Zelda said, standing up and pulling her close. Lilith smiled and pecked her lips softly. “I know. I want to,” The demoness said, moving a strand of hair behind the redhead's ears. Green eyes closed as the woman enjoyed the soft touch. The first witch decided she wanted to see this side of the Spellman matriarch as often as she would be allowed.</p><p>Zelda pressed her flush against her body, feeling the cold of the environment on her naked skin. Warming up slightly under the contact. Another kiss later, and they were finally parted.  “Go, get dressed. You are awfully distracting, Ms. Spellman.”</p><p>“I could say the same about you, Ms. Wardwell,” Zelda threw from over her shoulders but walked away. Shaking her head, Lilith walked downstairs with a spring in her steps that wasn’t there the previous day.</p><p>By the time Zelda had walked downstairs, the smell of freshly brewed coffee, bacon, and eggs took over the entire ground floor. There was something else, too. “You baked bread?” She wondered, standing up in the middle of the room, wearing the dress she had on the previous night, still half-opened.  She placed her jacket on the back of a chair.</p><p>“You need help with that?” Lilith asked. A nod later and she was walking to the redhead to help her with her dress. “I like to bake…” the demoness confessed, with a blush taking her cheeks.</p><p>“I love to eat,” Zelda grinned, pecking her lips once more. Both stunned for a second at the familiarity that settled over them so easily.</p><p>“Come on, then. I feel I should offer you some lunch, but sadly the store is a place I avoid as much as I can.”</p><p>“Lunch?” Zelda frowned.</p><p>“Yes. It seems we are just past it,” Lilith shrugged, pointing to the clock on the wall. “I can’t remember a day in my life that I’ve slept this much.”  </p><p>Zelda blinked. She was in so much trouble. There was no way she could sneak in without having to come up with an explanation of sorts for her sister. Mary’s hand found hers and gave it a reassuring squeeze.</p><p> “Sorry, I was thinking….”</p><p>“What you are going to tell them, right?” Lilith offered. She hadn’t ever been in Zelda’s shoes, but she wasn’t unaware of how families worked. She needed to know, so she could play her cards accordingly.  “I don’t mind if you tell them you were here.”</p><p>The redhead frowned. Not that it worried her what her family would think about this, whatever it was they were developing. However, she didn’t want to disclose it. She wanted to keep it quiet until they had a more secure footing into it. Especially when what she was doing with Faustus was still playing in the foreground. The Spellman’s still came first.</p><p>“I’m not sure, Mary,” Zelda sighed. Lilith flinched at the name, the most obvious proof that things wouldn’t be honest between them despite it all. “I… If you agree, I want to keep this thing we have going between us just for the two of us. Until we understand what it is. Until we know for sure it’s not just shared magic bringing this upon us.” She finished, chewing her lip anxiously waiting for any reaction.</p><p>Certainly, it wasn’t a no. Zelda’s rambling was a promise of some sort of future along the lines, and Lilith’s heart raced at that chance. Still, there was so much happening or in need of happening, that the demoness wasn’t sure she even wanted to allow this thing to go any further.</p><p>“I understand, Zelda. It was just an offering,” she smiled. The Spellman matriarch took their joined hands and brought the teacher’s knuckles to her lips. Placing a soft, warm kiss atop them and then one on the inside of her wrist. Shivers ran down Lilith’s spine and goosebumps rose in her arms.</p><p>“Don’t fret, I’ll come up with something,” Zelda whispered. They finished their brunch slowly, taking their time. What they did was done. There was no way to diminish the time Zelda was away from her home. Half an hour less or more wouldn’t make any difference at this point. So, they enjoyed every second spend in quiet company, relishing in the familiarity of it all.</p><p>When there was nothing else for them to do with their meals, they stood up. As if Zelda was leaving using any mortal means, Lilith walked her to the door. It was an impulse, really, what had made them embrace tightly. “Don’t worry about me,” Zelda whispered in her ear. “Please… Forgive me when I hurt us again.”</p><p>“I will. Do what you must, and I’ll do what I must,” Lilith agreed. One last peck later and Zelda was gone. The demoness bit her lower lip, still savoring the ghost touch of the redhead’s lips on hers. She waved her hand to bring the things they used to the sink and started the mundane task of cleaning up.</p><p>Stolas cawed then. She rolled her eyes. “No, Stolas. I’m not setting the Dark Lord’s plans aside. I’ll very much still be completing the needed sacrifice as I planned before. I must find the child at her mortal school to assess if her two remaining chums have finally cast her aside.”</p><p>Zelda transported herself straight into her room. There was no use in showing up, with a lack of explanations as to where she had been, and pretend she hadn’t slept away. Her attire would give her away immediately. As she showered, she came up with a story to tell.</p><p>“Father Blackwood requested a meeting, and I had to remain after it, to include some modifications to the syllabus of Ancient tongues. Things that fell out from it with the passing of the years, and you know, with no one half-decent to teach it. I needed to consult some books, and you all know how I can get lost in my own world. I never even realized it was this late until I ran out of cigarettes,” she practiced in front of her mirror. Yes, a perfectly believable plot, she thought to herself as she got dressed.</p><p>The Spellman mortuary surprised Zelda with its emptiness. She should’ve figured that. Since Ambrose wasn’t having sex loudly as he usually was with his new boy-toy, nor is he was deafening the corpses with his music. Hilda was nowhere to be seen, leaving Zelda to guess she was at that mortal shop she likes to call work.  Doubting for a second, she checked up on the last of the inhabitants of her home.</p><p>Sabrina’s door was closed. Some soft noises were coming from inside, which meant she was home. Since breaking up with the Kinkle boy, the teen was so broken-hearted that she didn’t want to eat or go out of her room.</p><p>Knowing the pains of losing something dear, and that her loss was most likely magnified by her mortal-half teen feelings -as everything seemed to be- Zelda had agreed to let her mourn the loss. The principal had found nothing against Zelda’s announcement that Sabrina would miss school for a week. Shaking her head, she made herself ready to survive a moment with the overly dramatic teen emotions. Then Zelda knocked on the door.</p><p>A moment later, she was comforting her niece once more. Her shoulder was damp with the tears of the child. Zelda wished nothing more than to protect her. Yet, she realized her decision of not helping her to cross to the mortal limbo was the right one. Sabrina needed to grow, and Zelda needed to let her.</p><p>A tear or two escaped Zelda’s eyes, and she wondered what would’ve happened if she hadn’t slept with that mysterious witch the previous night, no matter how innocent it all was. She wondered if she would’ve been able to help Sabrina move along when she did not understand what it was like to be this in love before then.</p><p>Her eyes widened. She wasn’t in love… She couldn’t be.</p><p>No. She would not be! She forbade her own heart to do such a stupid thing. She would rip the damned organ to shreds before it happened to her.</p><p>If only it wasn’t already too late. </p><p> </p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0016"><h2>16. Chapter 16</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There was a joy in Zelda Spellman that made the residents of the mortuary look at her twice and exchange confused glances. No matter how hard she had tried to cover it with her usual brand of bitterness and haughtiness, the spring on her step had been perceivable since they found her after her disappearance act.</p><p>Once her explanation about her disappearance had been delivered, Hilda and Ambrose had exchanged a glance, not quite buying the story of Zelda forgetting herself at the Academy’s library. As far as Ambrose had reported back to Hilda, the redhead always was there the least time possible or locked away in her office when getting back home was not doable. They feared the worst. They dreaded it had to do with whatever she was doing with Faustus Blackwood and were concerned about her well-being. There wasn’t anything they could do about it. Zelda Spellman was stubborn. They knew if they crossed her, she would do it, anyway. No matter how wrong they could prove she was. So they let her be.</p><p>Zelda drove Sabrina to the school, reassuring her that things would be not good but bearable. “If not, you can always use the balm your Auntie Hilda made for you,” She said, caressing her cheek. While hoping for a glimpse of the other witch to have a quick chat about Sabrina’s state of mind. No such luck. At that time, Lilith was already sitting in her office wondering if she would see the teen that day. If she didn’t, the demoness would have to be blunter about it and go check the Spellman’s home. That was something that could be too risky for her fake identity, for her plans, and maybe even for her heart.</p><p>The mother of demons couldn’t help the smirk when she noticed the blonde head among the students. A sigh of relief to know that she would be able to check up on her without having to face her Aunt. Then everything went even better until it went all wrong. Her friends knew the child was a witch, and they had… <em>Supported</em> her.</p><p>“What kind of world is this?” Lilith wondered, totally taken aback by that reaction. Still, she took up a glamor of a teen and invited Mr. Steve Loomis to the woods, his virgin smell telling her all she needed to know. So, when the witching hour arrived, there she was, the mother of demons with a smelly teen that was about to become her sacrifice.</p><p>The Greendale thirteen appeared in front of her easily, and their wrath was quickly fueled by hers. Lilith fell asleep almost as peacefully as she had a couple of days earlier with the redhead in her arms.</p><p>The next morning, she followed the Greendale’s coven to their church, and if it weren’t for her dark glasses, everyone would see her roll her eyes to the non-sense spewed from Blackwood’s mouth. Oh, how she hated that man. It was only worse when it combined with the humming on her blood and a memory of the betrayal she felt the last time she saw Zelda and Faustus in the same room.</p><p>In the front rows, Zelda had issues remaining still. She couldn’t be too obvious while trying to find the excommunicated witch. What was she doing there, anyway? The redhead was curious, but she couldn’t simply find her and ask for explanations, could she?</p><p>Instead, they had rushed home before Sabrina planned something, and Zelda offered to save Greendale. If she was honest, the eldest Spellman could keep the school safe if she ever showed the true extent of her powers, but why fight alone, when she knew Sabrina would jump at the chance of saving the mortals? Covering her need to impress the other witch with her display of power with the Spellman’s name and Edward’s ways.</p><p>Summoning the Anemoi was a piece of cake. Winds blowing up quickly as they willed, sending the tornado alert out for the town to gather at the school. The Spellman’s, less Sabrina, hurried around the school, sealing and binding all the many windows and doors surrounding the old building, hoping not to be seen. An explanation at ready if they were.</p><p>The witching hour approached fast. Zelda’s excitement ran wild in Lilith’s blood. The demoness energy also working anxiously underneath the redhead’s skin. They could feel each other near, and although Zelda had yet to see the brunette witch, as they were, they could conquest the world if they wanted.</p><p>The demoness knew joining hands with Zelda Spellman during the witching hour was something she should avoid happening. So, that morning after the emergency meeting of the coven, Lilith had approached Constance Blackwood. Asking all the lovely questions expected from a spinster to a mother to be, the demoness placed her hand over the protruding belly. Pushing a small incantation towards the children and accelerating their growth.</p><p>“Qui affecto protego mixtisque iubas serpentibus et posteris meis stirpique,” the protection words of an ancient spell were chanted in three places around Greendale. Magic brewing high all around them. Lilith could feel it, the powers of the coven scattered in the three sites and the one from the Greendale thirteen who she had summoned, mixing up with the humming of Zelda’s still controlled power. ‘Why do you hide it from your family, Zelda?’ the demoness wondered.</p><p>Then it happened, the humming that pointed to their nearness was cut as Zelda disappeared from Baker High.</p><p>That was Lilith’s sign to go in search of the remaining Spellman’s, knowing that Zelda wasn’t there to complain or argue about her plan. It was the way it should happen, and deep down the demoness knew this. If Zelda was there, there wouldn’t be an excuse for her to take Sabrina. Their combined strength as they had felt them during the exorcism, the one that was vibrating under their skin before, was more than enough to keep the whole Greendale protected with no casualties.</p><p>But Lilith wouldn’t ever tell this to Zelda. Another line to add to the growing list of lies she should keep buried from the redhead. No matter how she wanted to spew them all, coming clean for once and beg for Zelda’s forgiveness... Her crown… the mother of demons could see it so close now; she could almost feel it over her head.</p><p>Lies… One after another left Lilith’s mouth in order to make the teen sign her name. There was a reason Sabrina could call forth hellfire, and it wasn’t her name on that book. The demoness knew this. If present, Zelda would know of this… yet, Sabrina’s oldest aunt wasn’t there, and the mother of demons knew exactly which buttons to push for the child to do the Dark Lord’s will.</p><p>She wasn’t there when it happened though, the Dark Lord was a jealous one and Lilith was willed away from the signing moment. Until he called her again to bring Sabrina to the Hanging Tree. To watch her burn the witches she had recalled forth, or burn them herself if only to get rid of them now... Once Sabrina tried to summon the Hellfire, the Greendale Thirteen would be of no use anymore.</p><p>If she wasn’t so enthralled by the blue flames and the feeling she knew all so well, she would’ve noticed the way the witches reacted to Sabrina’s last name. Lilith would’ve made the connection sooner. The demoness was mesmerized by the blue light she was so fond of, and as souls were consumed, and ashes covered them, the list of witches who could summon hellfire added one more.</p><p>“Ms. Wardwell?” Sabrina asked as ashes fell and she was coming down from her rage high. “Who were the other three?”</p><p>“Lilith. The first woman and first witch,” she started a self-deprecating smile hidden in the dark. “An army surrounded her, and feeling not strong enough to fly or fight at that point, she summoned hellfire and burned their souls. Only sparing the children in that army. A mistake, if you ask me. Those kids eagerly announced what they saw to anyone who would listen. From then, they called her a Demoness.” Lilith said, not looking at the teen worried what she would be able to read on her face. Instead, she continued, “Aradia, did it next.”</p><p>“The daughter of Diana and Lucifer? From the Gospel of the Witches?” Lilith smiled. There was one use to their W.I.C.C.A club.</p><p>“Precisely. Aradia, as you might’ve read, was made a mortal to fulfill her prophecy. She was supposed to teach the magic ways to any mortal who dared to learn. She’s the only one who has summoned hellfire to show to mortals how great their powers could be if they wielded them with courage.”</p><p>“The mortal’s can have powers?” Sabrina frowned in confusion.</p><p>“That’s what Aradia came to teach,” Lilith shrugged. “I’ve seen mortals trying to learn to wield magic and failing catastrophically.”</p><p>“And the third one?” She asked as they sauntered back to Baxter High.</p><p>“Ah, the unnamed witch. One that went to the legends as the heir of Brigid, for her likeness to the Goddess. She had called forth hellfire to end a battle. Mortals had pleaded with the witch to help them. Once she did, they tried to burn her on the stake. Only to find out she disappeared as the first flames licked her skin. The legend says she swore never help a mortal again.”</p><p>“So, you don’t know who she is?” Sabrina frowned.</p><p>“No. No one does. All that was passed from generation to generation is that she was in the likes of Brigid. Don’t dwell on it, Sabrina. We can now claim your spot on the list. Your motive is clear, to stop the destruction of everything you know and love. You must be proud of your achievements, by far yours is the noblest usages of Hellfire to this day.”</p><p>“I’m not sure if I’m proud of what I’ve done, Ms. Wardwell. A few months back, I was certain I would never hurt a soul. Be that animal, mortal or witch, and now, I’ve done things… I’ve burned out thirteen souls… There won’t be a rest for them. They won’t go to the fake God’s heaven. They won’t go to Satan’s hell. They just… stopped existing, because of me.”</p><p>“Well, we all have done things we aren’t proud of, Sabrina. Bear in mind that even if you aren’t, you did it for the greater good. There was no other way this could’ve played out.” Lilith said.</p><p>There were many, though. The demoness could’ve not summoned the thirteen. And even when summoned, if instead of pushing Zelda out of the way, she kept her beside her, they would’ve saved town without the ultimate sacrifice of the burned souls. But that would’ve defeated the purpose, and Sabrina wouldn’t have completed another step of her own prophecy.</p><p>They reached Baxter High the moment the mortals were leaving the basement. Sabrina finding her younger Aunt half-collapsed towards the entry where they had left her. No words of what she’d done had been exchanged. They just embraced.</p><p>Lilith watched the youngling and her aunt and felt something inside her break. She was breaking this girl in the same way she had been broken before. However, there was no one else to blame for the choices the demoness had made. Lilith had been alone in the wastelands. There were still not as many mortals or witches around. What else was she supposed to do? When someone had offered more than she thought she could ever have after fleeting her father’s paradise?</p><p>At the academy, Zelda stopped working. Constance was bleeding out and there was a baby girl on the bassinet. One girl that wouldn’t have the best of the fates as things were. There was Mary’s power running excitedly under her skin and it was so easy to teleport the babe out of the academy protected walls and into the Spellman mortuary.</p><p>“What did you do?” Prudence asked, scared by her actions, and worried about consequences.</p><p>“Don’t worry, I’ll keep her safe as Constance asked. Let’s get back to work, Lady Blackwood doesn’t have much time left, Prudence. We both know that girl isn’t safe with your father.” Zelda said in a tone that left no space to doubt. “You can turn me into him if you prefer. But do you really want the blood of your half-sister in your hands?”  Adding a persuasion spell to her words. Prudence didn’t quite know what hit her before she nodded her agreement. If Zelda could’ve seen the future, she would’ve erased the entire event from Prudence’s mind.</p><p>As every time during their long lives, night gave space to the day. While Lilith got ready to face another day, waiting for the Dark Lord to call her back and forget everything about this forsaken land and all its inhabitants. Sabrina looked herself in the mirror and found the white hair terrifying and alluring, a telltale sign of how much she had changed in just one night. Zelda woke up for the thousandth time to feed the stolen child, feeling as if for once she did something right in her life.</p><p>There was one thing that was clear as time moved further along… Known and unknown prophecies were being fulfilled, and destiny, as always, was in motion.</p>
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<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Chapter 17</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It wasn’t until later that day when the weight of what she’d done the previous night fully settled on Zelda’s shoulders. She had to get herself to the Academy, Hilda had to go to that dreadful shop. Ambrose, as per usual now, was nowhere to be found, and Sabrina had school. What would she do with the babe? It was just a few hours, really, before she could get back home and take charge of the child again.</p><p>“Hilda…” The younger sister sighed. The redhead knows she knows what’s coming.</p><p>“I’ve already spoken with Doctor Cee, he agreed I could take the babe with me and have her in his office, Zelds.” What Hilda didn’t quite expect was the kiss on the cheek she got after that. “Who are you and what have you done with my sister?” She asked, getting an annoyed roll of eyes.</p><p>“I can’t believe you will help me, Hildie,” she whispered in that tone she rarely used.</p><p>“We are sisters, Zelds. We are in this together. We can figure out the schedule as we go, just like we did with Sabrina.”</p><p>“Speaking of that witch… Where is she? I haven’t seen her since Faustus pulled me out of Baker high to assist Lady Blackwood,” the redhead frowned then. “I saw Ambrose at the Academy at night. How did you two keep the entire building safe?”</p><p>“Ah…”</p><p>“Good morning, Aunties,” Sabrina said, interrupting them. One astonished Ambrose trailing behind her. The Spellman sisters turned around to find the now platinum white head of their niece. That could’ve only meant one thing.</p><p>“What on Satan’s name happened when I left?” Zelda asked. She had felt Ms. Wardwell’s excited energy during the entire event. It was part of the reason there was a baby in her room. The eldest Spellman had also felt something alter the balance of powers, if only for a moment until it had settled. She frowned deeply. How could she even know something disrupted the balance? Shaking her thoughts away quickly. Seeing that Sabrina looked like that cat who ate the canary.</p><p>“I kinda… Well…”</p><p>“Spit it out, Sabrina. We don’t have an eternity to wait…” The babe wailed then.</p><p>“Wait, is that a baby?”</p><p>“Yes, I’ll bring her down. Then you lot will explain to me what the heavens happened when I left.” They all had some idea of what happened with Sabrina, the hair change was quite telling. Zelda herself used to have shiny ebony hair until she signed her name and became the redhead she was now. ‘Oh, what a blessing to be this child! A spitting image of Brigid, that’s now who she is’ someone from the old coven they belonged back then had said. Those words were part of the reason the Spellman’s moved to the New World. The only good that had come out of her appearance came from those nuns that had helped her nurse her wounds when she had her second encounter with the stake.</p><p>Pushing her memories as far as she could, while wondering why they seemed to try to get free from where she had pushed them, she finally got downstairs carrying the baby. The aww that came from the two women in the room send shivers down her spine. It was something Zelda had wanted, to become a mother, but she was terrified of inheriting her power and failing the child in the same way her parents had failed her. So she hadn’t. Not that she had taken any precautions not to, she was never blessed with one.</p><p>“Where did she come from?” Sabrina asked, standing up and rushing to check on the child.</p><p>“Your Aunt Zelda stole her.” Hilda grinned. “We are going to raise her as a Spellman.”</p><p>“It’s not important how I came with the child. Do not delay your explanations any further, Sabrina. It’s obvious to all of us that you finally signed the Book of the Beast.” The teen lowered her head and sighed.</p><p>“How did you know?”</p><p>“The hair, darling,” Hilda chuckled. “I used to be a brunette. Your father was the blonde Spellman.”</p><p>“Mine just got darker,” Ambrose added, taking a bite from his bacon.</p><p>“And yours, Auntie Zee?” Sabrina asked, unable to picture her Aunt as anything but the stern redhead that had raised her.</p><p>“Ah, your Auntie Zee, used to have this beautiful black hair. I’d adored it! I wanted mine turning to that shade. Not that I would complain about how it turned out.” Hilda grinned.</p><p>“So, it’s normal? To have your hair change?”</p><p>“As our parents explained to us, it’s the dark Lord’s visual reminder that you are his now. Even if you dye it, it will get back to this new state. Until your old age, that’s it,” Zelda shrugged. “Now, go on. How did that come to happen?”</p><p>“Ms. Wardwell…” Sabrina said, avoiding her Aunt’s eyes. “She came to us, mentioned something about going offensive, and she took me to the woods to sign my name. Before you get mad, Aunt Zee, she told me exactly what you’ve all said before. That I would get access to my full powers and she added I needed them to help the town.”</p><p>Zelda sat back, worry etched on her face. Was Sabrina the unbalancing force she felt? Or was it Mary? The redhead was quite aware of the extent of the brunette powers, and she had felt quite balanced, but her niece had changed. “And what exactly did you do to help the town, Sabrina?”</p><p>“I followed what the Malum Malus had shown to me, Auntie, and I feel terrible about it,” Sabrina said, her eyes filling with unshed tears. “I-I summoned the Greendale thirteen and…” the teen suckled her lower lip and surprising her, Zelda found her hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.</p><p>“Whatever you’ve done, Sabrina. It’s done. There’s no turning back to change it,” Zelda whispered. Wisely. Already dreading her niece’s next answer. “Now, tell us, what happened next?”</p><p>“I summoned hellfire and burned the souls of the Thirteen Witches to ashes.” There was only silence left after that confession. The teen’s lowered head said enough about how sorry she was. Still, it was surprising the youngest Spellman hadn’t come up with excuses and reasons to explain why she did it. Memories of her dreams took over the matriarch, the blue fire she had seen... She shook her head.</p><p>“He-Hell fire?” Hilda asked. “Are you sure? That’s not an easy one, Sabrina. There were only three witches who summoned it before…” Zelda squirmed in her place.</p><p>“Yeah, Ms. Wardwell told me about them. Do you guys know who is the third one? Ms. Wardwell said the only thing known about her is that she looked like Brigid. I don’t even know what that means…” She shrugged.</p><p>“There are no records of the third one’s name, Sabrina,” Zelda said, sternly. “She made sure her name remained unknown. I guess, just like yourself, she wasn’t proud of her actions. However, you should be, Sabrina. From what I’ve heard, the Crimson Avenger was vanquished before the end of the witching hour.”</p><p>“Ms. Wardwell said, without the rage that summoned him, there was no strength to keep him attached to this realm.”</p><p>“Then you saved the day, cuz,” Ambrose added.</p><p>“It seems I did. And the baby?” She frowned, looking at the cooed child.</p><p>“There’s no time for explanations now. Hilda, take her. We are all late.” Zelda rushed to get out of the room. She needed to get out. She needed to breathe. Sabrina was the unbalancing force she had felt, but what did that mean? The redhead also wanted to know why, or how the teacher had figured out that Sabrina could summon hellfire.</p><p>To add to it all, there was the matter of Faustus Blackwood. Zelda could only hope that her grasp on him remained now as his child’s Night mother. Even after losing Lady Blackwood’s.</p><p>Across town, Lilith took her seat at her office. Marveling at her work. She made the girl sign her name, fulfilling her part in his plans. Yes, the mother of demons was aware of the prophecy surrounding the child. There was no point in dwelling on it, she’d read it thousands of times, it only said she would become the Herald of Hell. So the demoness had fulfilled the task the Dark Lord had entrusted in her, added some bonus events to help fulfill it. She had been good, he would call her back. He would make her the Queen. Lilith was sure of it... Almost.</p><p>There was a light thrill throbbing in her blood coming from the redhead. She frowned, why did she miss the woman? Why did her heart keep skipping a beat when she thought of her? It’d been Zelda’s odd feelings that helped Lilith to endure a day full of teenage hormones exacerbated by the near-death experience of a tornado passing through town. Principal Hawthorne harassing ways had also grown tiredly annoying.</p><p>The mother of demons wasn’t quite surprised when no lashing or betrayal runs beneath her skin during that day. She knew what she had done to keep Zelda away the previous night. Maybe the despicable man would finally stop hurting the redhead, and her too, while he took care of the children that had had to be born the previous night.</p><p>When she finally arrived home, Lilith didn’t quite expect the knock on her door, but if the growing intensity of the humming underneath her skin was something to go by, there wouldn’t be a need to check who it was.</p><p>“Why didn’t you just teleport inside?” The demoness smiled, confused by this beauty standing outside of her home. Zelda chewed her lower lip and shrugged.</p><p>“I’m not quite certain myself. May I?”</p><p>“Yes, of course,” Lilith said, getting out of the way. It was highly awkward, as that morning after should’ve been but wasn’t. “I was making some tea?” The redhead nodded, following her to the kitchen.</p><p>“How did you know?” Zelda blurted while checking that the tea is in fact one coming from a box and not some concoction as Hilda would make. She might be in love with the woman in front of her, but she still didn’t quite trust her, and everyone knew tea could be tricky coming from a witch.</p><p>“How did I know what?” Lilith wondered, turning around and taking the tray back to the living room. They sit on opposite chairs with the tray settled on the table between them. “I didn’t hex the tea, Zelda,” the demoness grinned, amused.</p><p>“I know, it’s… I’m not sure what it is,” Zelda shook her head. “How did you know Sabrina would be able to summon hellfire?” She tried again. Beside her, the demoness sighed.</p><p>“I didn’t.” The mother of demons confessed, for once, answering the truth.</p><p>“I don’t understand, then…”</p><p>“I knew she would sign her book to access her full powers. If only because everything she loves was in danger. I mentioned a thing or two about being offensive instead of defensive. I do know your niece, Zelda. She loves to pick up fights against what seems unbeatable. Sabrina always takes care of the underdog. I think she got that from you.” Lilith smiled, finally reaching out to link their hands together. “I've missed you,” she let out, “and no, I’m not deflecting your question, just stating a truth.”</p><p>“As weird as it sounds, I've missed you too,” Zelda whispered. Lilith sucked her lip, barely holding a smile, before shaking herself.</p><p>“Back to your niece, I took her to the woods, yes. Still, I wish I could know what happened. I showed her the book, and I guess I wasn’t invited. I felt this dizzy spell for a second.”</p><p>“As if something had unbalanced the equilibrium of powers?” Zelda asked.</p><p>“Precisely. You felt that too?” Lilith frowned in confusion. ‘How was that even possible?’ she thought.</p><p>“Indeed. It was inebriating for a second until it was gone again,” she waved in dismissal and took a sip of her tea. “You left my sister alone to face the Greendale Thirteen.”</p><p>“As far as I was concerned, you all were there, until <em>you</em> went missing. Whatever happened for you to leave your family behind?”</p><p>“Lady Blackwood went into labor. She didn’t make it, the poor thing.” They fell silent for a second. “How did it happen? How did she know how to summon hellfire?”</p><p>“I wish I could give you answers, Zelda. Truth is, I wasn’t sure what would happen after taking her to the woods. I intended to bring her back to school, to your sister, and remain with them until the end of the witching hour. I guess the Dark Lord had other plans, because when I asked her if he’d shown her something to help us. Sabrina knew exactly where to go and what to do. I was utterly surprised when I heard the words of the Hellfire summoning spell.”</p><p>“You know the words?” Zelda frowned.</p><p>“Don’t you?” She countered. “It doesn’t mean I can summon it, though.” Lilith dismissed, hoping the witch wouldn’t question it and she wouldn’t have to lie about that too. The demoness frowned, confused when the redhead squirmed in her seat.  “Would you’ve used it if you could?”</p><p>“To save Greendale?” The eldest Spellman asked, considering it for a while. “I’m not sure if I would.”</p><p>“Not even for your family?”</p><p>“My family isn’t Greendale. We could’ve left. I could’ve spirited them away. I could’ve spirited you away with us.” Zelda confessed in a whisper. “I thought about it.”</p><p>“Will you stay, tonight?” Lilith asked in the same whispering manner.</p><p>“I can’t. I will come back to you the moment I can. I promise you that,” Zelda said, bringing their linked hands to her mouth and placing a kiss on the inner side of the teacher’s wrist.</p><p>“I’ll hold you to that promise then,” the demoness said. Their glances locked, and they stood up. Soft lips collided in a languid, heartfelt kiss. Until a tickling sensation was all that it was left. Lilith was alone in the room. </p>
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<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Chapter 18</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>The levels of heresy built into this fic would have me burned at the stake, be this any other time xD<br/>Enjoy it!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>A week later and there still was no sign of the Dark Lord, and Zelda Spellman was also still missing from her bed. Lilith's murderous side screamed for release. It had been too long since she last killed someone while feeling this despair. She needed to kill someone; anyone would do. It wasn’t hard to choose who, when Principal Hawthorne had taken her annoyance levels further.</p><p>The demoness had accepted his constant threats of a date, invited him to her home, and had him for dinner. In her rage, she had also killed her familiar that night. How dared he, that demon-crow, to say out loud what she had been thinking for a while now? How dared he to voice her worries without a care for her feelings? No, the Dark Lord wouldn’t replace her for a teen. No matter how the Spellman child had unbalanced the forces when she signed her name.</p><p>Lilith had signed her name too. Her blood was the first-ever smeared line in that thing. It had occurred a millennium or two after she had bowed to him. When he needed something to show off for, she had smeared her blood and had convinced others to do the same by her actions. Promising them powers in the like of the ones she wielded in exchange. The balance had been thrown off then, and in her obsession with being loved by Lucifer, she hadn’t understood quite why.</p><p>It was surprising for her to see the signees changing their hair appearance. Lucifer had smiled at her when she confronted him about it. “Didn’t yours changed when you left our father’s garden?” Lilith stopped to think back to her reflection on the river of Eden. Her bright red hair had become darkened when she fleeted ‘paradise’. “Have not I changed?” He’d continued, and he had. His hooves were enough proof to his point. “Then, why would they not?” He had concluded. The demoness found no fault in it.</p><p>It was that same day, once she finally was alone, that three envoys from her father, her creator, had appeared to her. Asking her what had she done to alter the balance. Lilith refused to give them any explanations. They had been brothers to him, and they had been there when her love was cast out of Heaven. They had been guardians to her before she left… Yet, they had never helped her... <em>“Ananiel, Bezaliel, Gadreel,”</em> she rolled her eyes at the trio of Watchers.</p><p><em>“Lilith, there’s an unbalance that we cannot atone,”</em> Ananiel announced. Lilith snorted.</p><p><em>“Isn’t your God omnipotent? Why isn’t he fixing it then?”</em> She waved in mocking dismissal.</p><p><em>“There’s a fix but God, our creator, your father, leaves this in your hands as it is your energy that caused it. When the equilibrium is reached in its perfect time, you will be part of the balance,”</em> Gadreel announced.</p><p><em>“I signed my name in a book,”</em> she raised her eyebrows in defiance. Bezaliel, who had always been closer to the first woman, sat beside her. <em>“What harm could a smear of my blood on a piece of paper bring? Besides, he promised me to make me his Queen,”</em> Lilith confessed in a whisper.</p><p><em>“Don’t you see you were already one, Lilith?</em>” Bezaliel whispered, moving a strand of formerly red hair out of Lilith’s face.</p><p><em>“Me? I cannot be. I’m nothing without him,”</em> she said.</p><p><em>“Yet, is your name in his book what has taken the equilibrium off balance. Don’t you think that’s telling, Lilith?”</em> Bezaliel added as if that would clarify things to the already broken being.</p><p><em>“Go away, you three… Leave me alone as you all have done when I needed you the most. When he was forcing himself on top of me on that place our father called a Paradise.”</em> She groused.</p><p><em>“Hear me, Lilith,”</em> Ananiel said in its booming voice. <em>“The day will come that the balance will be restored, and then, one day, you’ll find what you’ve always longed for. Soon after that time, the balance will be broken again. When the latter happens, the prophecies will be fulfilled. You will become the Dawn before doom, and only with perfect balance, there will be a future for your kind. Your father has spoken.”</em></p><p>Now, after feeling the unbalance, Lilith wondered what had they meant back then. Tempting her to call her father, the fake-God, for help and guidance after all this time.</p><p>No, she wouldn’t falter. Not after leading her life as far from his grasp as she could. The demoness would figure out how the Spellman’s child fell into this mess, and then she would sever any connections. Killing everything that got in her way. No matter how many numbing potions she would have to drink to keep her foolish heart from feeling.</p><p>On the days that went by since she had visited Ms. Wardwell, Zelda was painfully reacquainted with exhaustion. She didn’t remember being this tired since, well, since the first months of Sabrina being part of their household and the first weeks of recovery after her second almost-death at the stake, long before that.</p><p>The Spellman’s had solved some issues with their schedule, and some minor issues, including the fact that Sabrina had disclosed to her friends she was a witch… That they were all witches. No matter how much her niece had told them her friends were okay with it, the young witch, too, was afraid of pushing too much into them. Burdening them too much with this new truth that had found a way out. So she had asked her Auntie to please let her skip some classes. Zelda had turned the blind eye to that, provided that her niece took care of the baby for the few hours Hilda and herself were too tangled in work.</p><p>Zelda was so exhausted that not even the sadness flowing to her from the other witch was enough to gather strength to visit her. Then, there were just days left before Yule, and she was excited to celebrate another holiday. The redhead had to keep herself from showcasing the sadness that wasn’t hers while worrying about the baby’s future. At least, she wasn’t getting Ms. Wardwell hurt at this point. Small mercies, she thought.</p><p>There was something that Hilda understood from her sister, and it was that, beyond her cold exterior, Zelda loved fiercely. The blonde sister knew, for the way she was still alive even after being killed one time too many, yet carefully dragged back to Cain’s Pit to be resurrected. For how the redhead would sit with Ambrose and talk about everything and anything at all, and the most telling one, the way Sabrina herself cared. Hilda knew the way her niece cared wasn’t only her doing, but Zelda’s who had raised her as her own.  She knew this bonding with Leticia could, and most likely would, break Zelda’s heart. Despite her sister being in tremendous control of her emotions, Hilda knew she was keeping them at bay. Hiding from her.</p><p>So, when Zelda made up her mind after the Solstice excitement, Hilda wondered how long it would take until her sister broke to pieces and finally picked them up without them even noticing how many there were left and how many would never be recovered.</p><p>Hilda remembered, though, that it took Zelda almost a month of exhausting herself over a mix of Sabrina, and alcohol when Edward passed away. The guilt of having to raise Diana’s child, of having been deemed worthy of it, even after the way she had given them the cold shoulder had been much to bear, or so Hilda concluded. But Zelda had picked herself up so fast when Diana’s family tried to get Sabrina, and one day, life continued.</p><p>What Hilda didn’t know was that Zelda wasn’t fighting only her own demons now, but Lilith’s feelings under her skin were also weighing on her. The eldest Spellman passed every single minute she could with Leticia in her arms, dreading the moment she would have to part while wanting nothing more than to get herself to the cottage in the woods and fall on Mary’s healing arms.</p><p>Zelda knew, deep in her mind, that even if Hilda couldn’t read them, her feelings were still being showcased to the brunette. Like a bad song you never wanted to hear, but that was catchy enough that you can’t quite get rid of. Try as she might, the redhead couldn’t help it. She would if she could. She would’ve detached herself from the teacher a long while ago if only to stop the woman from feeling all the pain she was so adept to put her through.</p><p>The Saturday before the end of winter break, Zelda took Leticia to Dezmelda. She did it alone. Hilda said her goodbye to the child before heading for work. Ambrose wasn’t home as was usual, and Sabrina, sweet Sabrina, hugged her Aunt, asking for a way to mend her own breaking heart, while unknowingly giving her Auntie the strength to go on with her plans. Zelda knows she can’t keep forcing them to make bonds with the child while they all know bonds must be broken, and she can’t keep the child safe.</p><p>None of them are surprised when Zelda doesn’t come home that night. They all assume she’s alone, trying to get her bearings and pick up the pieces of herself that most likely lie scattered in thousands of pieces while keeping herself as far away from them as she can. Mending her heart will take a while, but fixing her facade, donning her armor, they all knew, wouldn’t take her that long.</p><p>They can’t even imagine that the moment she stepped from Dezmelda domains, she transported herself to the cottage not so far from their own home. To the only person who would be feeling exactly what she was feeling.</p><p>“Hold me,” she whispers to the room, and Lilith rushes to do so. Their powers humming, mixing as they always seemed to do. Their hearts beating at the same rhythm, and arms launching themselves to keep the other as close as they can. To breathe each other in. They don’t know quite why, how, or who started it, but they are both crying their hearts out with faces hidden away in the crook of their necks.</p><p>They don’t know quite why they are breaking, but they are, and that’s an unmistakable truth. “Stay?” Lilith whispers hoarsely in her ear, and Zelda chuckles tearily.</p><p>“I’ve promised you I would come and here I am.” The redhead says in the same whispering way. They don’t really need words for this, no matter how they don’t really know each other, or how Zelda doesn’t really trust the other witch. Or how the demoness knows she’s living a lie, allowing the eldest Spellman to believe in someone she’s not.</p><p>Yet they feel. They feel more than they dare. It’s terrifying and absolutely worth it.</p><p>They break their embrace begrudgingly. Hands quickly move to clean tears from the other’s stained face. A kiss, soft and warm, follows. ‘Why it’s always so sweet with her?’ they both wonder in thoughts but never voice it.</p><p>Instead, Lilith helps the witch to divests herself from her heavy winter jacket, and Zelda smiles, untying the knot that keeps the brunette’s robe in place. The demoness grins back, taking a couple of steps away to leave the redhead’s jacket hanging somewhere safe. Not caring about the way her robe doesn’t leave much to the imagination -Zelda has already seen it almost all - she walks back to the ginger and offers her a hand.</p><p>Hands securely clasped; they walk upstairs to the room. The demoness helps Zelda out of her pantsuit and slowly opens the buttons of her crisp white silken blouse. The redhead distracts her with another languid kiss before cold hands touch the first witch’s skin and burn their way up to her shoulders, hinting that the robe needs to go.</p><p>There’s too much happening at the same time. There are kisses and caresses. There’s warmth coming from underneath their skins. There are brokenness and despair. There’s that nagging feeling that’s too similar to love for them to be comfortable with it. So they stop, panting. Foreheads’ touching slightly, bodies tightly pressed.</p><p>“Zelda… I don’t mean to say no to you again, but we both know we are exhausted,” she sighed. ‘I don’t want to make love to you when it won’t be my name, the one you’ll call,’ Lilith thinks. “Would you mind if we just cuddle, again?”</p><p>“I was going to ask the same. Truthfully, I just want you to hold me,” Zelda confesses, embracing the brunette tightly, “and I was just dying to hold you since I left,” she whispers against her hair.</p><p>“Well, I can help you with that,” Lilith grins sheepishly, taking a step back, and pressing a quick peck on swollen lips. “Besides, I do love the way you look tangled in my sheets.” She winks, making the other woman roll her eyes in mock annoyance.</p><p>“I’ll take the bathroom first,” Zelda announces, and the demoness snorts.</p><p>“I wouldn’t have it any other way!” She grins. The mother of demons watches as the redhead steps out of previously discarded pants and saunters to the bathroom in an opened blouse, nude-colored underwear, and black heels, and shakes her head, amused at the show.</p><p>Making herself busy while she waits, Lilith finds a hanger for the pants, and folds them in a way they won’t be wrinkled come morning, and when the redhead is done, she takes her time admiring the view. “I think I like you the most when you look like this.”</p><p>“A mess?” Zelda snorts, looking at herself in the mirror. She’s clad only in her panties, her hairs braided loosely, and she has not an ounce of makeup left.</p><p>“Vulnerable,” Lilith says, but doesn’t add more to it before disappearing into the bathroom.</p><p>As if on repeat, she walks out to find Zelda with her glasses on and reading her book. This time, after turning the room lights off, the demoness doesn’t hesitate on joining the redhead on her bed. “You must read it to me now,” Lilith grins as she makes herself comfortable beside the witch, even closer than she did the first time around.</p><p>So, Zelda does, at least a couple of pages until the words become a blurry mess. Lilith takes the book from her, and then the glasses, pecking soft lips before turning around to place the items on her nightstand. She turns her lamp off and so does Zelda. They lay in silence for a while. “I meant it,” Lilith whispers.</p><p>“Huh?”</p><p>“That I like you the most when you look vulnerable.”</p><p>“Why?” Zelda wonders, but she can agree on that with the brunette. Mary looks nice when she’s vulnerable too.</p><p>“Because I know, despite how many lovers there could be, there aren’t as many people who had seen you like this. I know it’s something you allow me to witness, for some reason I don’t quite understand.”</p><p>“I…” Zelda starts but stops herself. The words on the tip of her tongue too powerful to just be let out. “I like how you can be vulnerable with me too,” she says instead.</p><p>“We are quite the mess, aren’t we?” Lilith wonders, snuggling closer. Zelda sighs.</p><p>“Yet, in the middle of my chaos… Here you lie, the paramount of calmness in my storm.” Lilith gulps, what can she say to that? Instead, she shows her appreciation. Kissing her Zelda once more while her tears mingle with the kiss. “I mean it,” Zelda says, finding her face and cleaning the tears away.</p><p>“I’m crying because I know you do,” Lilith answers, and Zelda understands. She too feels the cherished way the other woman is feeling, that’s so similar to the way she’s feeling. Sleep takes a while to come in search of them, but they don’t mind. They master the art of companionable silence that night. </p>
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<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Chapter 19</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Dear atlarep... it's not much, but's the little I can do from afar.<br/>Hope it helps.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lilith knows it’s past noon when they wake up for the way the light from the outside is cast inside her bedroom. She also knows it’s already getting dark out there. The light still doesn’t last quite so much in Greendale. It will last almost an entire day, at some point, when summer solstice arrives.</p><p>There’s a pang of guilt on her shoulders as she slowly untangles herself from the warmth of Zelda Spellman and sits against the headboard of her bed. She rubs her face tiredly. Lilith finds herself torn between her hopes of not being part of Greendale by that time of the year, having her crown over her head, finally ruling hell as Lucifer's equal. And keep learning everything there was to learn about the woman currently lying by her side on her bed, one that’s there out of her own free will and with no request of power in exchange, while breaking all of Lilith’s walls without really exchanging or asking much.</p><p>“Let me guess, we overslept again,” Zelda husks from her side. Lilith turns to watch her and finds that she looks almost like a kitty stretching on her bed. The redhead sits up, resting her head heavily over the teacher’s shoulders, placing a kiss there first. One day, she’ll understand why it’s so easy to be this soft and caring with the brunette, or so she swears to herself.</p><p>“It seems we did,” Lilith whispers, moving around enough that she can kiss her properly. “We were exhausted, and we knew it. I felt you…” She waves her hand as if that explains all the unwilling sharing of feelings, forced upon them by that night the demoness herself had made happen, unaware of this particular consequence to it. “What happened?” Zelda works her jaw, looking away. “You know, if you ever want to trust me, you’ll need to start with baby steps,” the demoness offers.</p><p>“Baby steps,” the redhead repeats. Zelda considers this for a while and figures out that there’s some truth in Mary’s words. “Would you believe me if I told you it has to do with an actual baby?” Lilith raises an eyebrow as an answer.</p><p>“I would, but I think we’ll need coffee for this conversation.” She pulls Zelda out of the bed, throws a robe to her, and chuckles when she notices their height difference is enough to make the robe look almost indecent on the redhead.</p><p>“What?” Zelda frowns. Lilith bites her lips mischievously and kisses her.</p><p>“I just like how you look,” the demoness shrugs it off before hurrying downstairs. Shaking her head, Zelda follows her suit. Once downstairs, she rummages the teacher’s fridge and together they work to whip up something that could almost pass for all the meals they skipped.</p><p>As they work, Zelda talks about Leticia. It’s surprisingly liberating to confess her last sin to Mary. The redhead doesn’t find any judgment coming from the other witch, and that makes her feel a bit less concerned. “Truthfully, knowing what he’s capable of with you, Zelda, I think what you’ve done it’s quite laudable,” Lilith says.</p><p>In truth, the demoness knows Faustus Blackwood far better than any other. She knows his deals, his desires, and his secret passions, as she should. Lilith is, after all, the one who usually deals with the ‘menial church stuff,’ that her Master deems unworthy of his time. She can’t tell Zelda that, though. The mother of demons had interfered enough in whatever relationship the redhead has with the Unholy Priest. She might not like the way he touches Zelda, but that’s the witch’s choice, and she won’t be the one keeping her from her own free will. They finish their meal with both lost in their thoughts.</p><p>“Maybe I should treat you to a date,” Zelda says after a while, breaking the comfortable silence they had been on. They are both lying back on their chairs, hands tangled together as if they belonged like that. A thrill runs down Zelda’s spine as Lilith's honest laugh hits her ears.</p><p>“Maybe you should,” the demoness answers. She has never been on a date herself, although she had interrupted several and orchestrated even more. “But not now, not until we know more of this,” Lilith offers.</p><p>The demoness wants to tell her who she is, to see if her name, and her background history, change something about the way Zelda Spellman treats her as if she is the most precious thing to have ever existed. The mother of demons is terrified, though, that the moment the redhead learns it, things change beyond repair. Lies too deep to be forgiven. Their status on the creation's design, too different to ask for a leap of faith that would keep them together. For Zelda to lose that devotion that seems to be her main source of comfort and believe she can be Lilith’s equal when she’s been taught differently all her life. “You think there’s hope for us?” The first witch wonders out loud after a while. Once more Zelda kisses the inner side of her wrist and goosebumps raise on her, Lilith’s blood almost boiling with the redhead’s action.</p><p>“What’s hope if not a desire for certain things to happen?” Zelda answers. “I suppose if we want this, no matter if this remnant of that night finally fades away. It is up to us to keep this. Is it not?”  The redhead counters her doubts wisely, looking at her unwavering in the eyes. Lilith wants to answer yes, but truth is, it’s been millennia since the last time anything was truly up to her. “Would you ever tell me what that forsaken word means?” Zelda asks then, making her chuckle.</p><p>“One day, perhaps. If this remnant of that night fades and we keep this thing going… Perhaps.” They both still feel broken, but there’s a level of healing that comes from being together. As if their mixed magic was mending them. As if the night spent cuddled up together was just for healing what they knew was broken, and those parts they don’t quite known are broken too. Although they feel them both equally as profoundly.</p><p>“I hate it seems I’m always leaving,” Zelda whispers when another hour goes by, and she knows she has to get back to the Mortuary.</p><p>“Then don’t think of it like that,” Lilith shrugs. “Consider you aren’t always leaving but always returning to me,” she offers, blushing with her own words. Zelda kisses her lips lovingly for this.</p><p>“Aren’t you quite the poet too?” The redhead grins. “I will return to you, Mary Wardwell, but now I need to go.”</p><p>Lilith wants to cry at the way she calls her. She’s not Mary Wardwell, and although inhabiting her body, she could never be. A tear does escape her eyes because of this. Because she’s betraying Zelda, betraying herself and those feelings that simmer under her skin, just by not blurting out her name. Cold thumbs press against her cheek and clean the treacherous tear away from her skin. “I promise you. I’ll always come back to you.”</p><p>“You shouldn’t promise things you won’t be able to fulfill, Zelda,” Lilith whispers. Thinking that the moment she’s called back to the pit it would be impossible for the redhead to find her. To return to her, no matter how hard she tries.</p><p>“I never do. I’ll see you when I see you?” Zelda offers cryptically and gets a tight hug as an answer.</p><p>“Please, don’t get killed,” the demoness whispers in her ear. Worried now even more for the redhead’s wellbeing. If Blackwood was to learn what she did with his child… There was no telling on how the man would react.</p><p>“I could ask the same of you,” the redhead counters. ‘I love you,’ she wants to add, but she stops herself. It’s too soon. It can’t be. She still is fighting it with all her might. Instead, she places a strand of hair behind the teacher’s ear and pecks soft lips as if she’s been doing it all her life. “Goodbye,” Zelda whispers before she disappears from the house.</p><p>Lilith gulps, letting herself fall to the ground. She can’t quite handle the emotions running inside her. The demoness just wants to go back to hell and stop her heart from feeling that thing she never thought she would feel, “Love,” she grouses as she tugs at her chest. “No, I refuse. I won’t. Do you hear me, Fake God? I won’t fall in love!” She shouts to the empty room.  “I refuse to feel this stupid feeling of your creation, Father.” She whispers as tears fall unwantedly from her eyes.</p><p>It’s not like he answers, or that she hopes for him to do it. No, she picks up the pieces of herself the best she knows how and gets ready for bed. For next the day, it will be her first official one as Principal Wardwell.</p><p>Back at the mortuary, Zelda heads straight to the library, picking the last book she had found. Still, learning nothing new about her current predicament. When she heads to bed way past the witching hour, she thinks about being surrounded by Mary’s arms and warmth, thus sending a wave of caring feelings towards Lilith.</p><p>On her bed, the demoness turns around towards where Zelda would’ve been lying if she was there and smiles. Grabbing the pillow that still smells like the redhead, she brings it as close to her as she can before she buries her nose in it. Cuddling up to it as if it was Zelda herself.</p><p>And even when all things point to the contrary, they both swear to themselves, they can’t possibly be in love.</p>
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<a name="section0020"><h2>20. Chapter 20</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first day back to the Academy finds Zelda being officially introduced as the Teacher of Ancient Tongues and Sacred Scripture. She doesn’t lie when she says she never expected to get back to a teaching position after Edward’s departure. The things she does for her family, she thinks.</p><p>It doesn’t escape to her the way Sister Jackson looks at her. It’s nothing new, Zelda knows this. It was already there, back when the three Spellman had first joined the Academy of Unseen Arts. The year they had moved from the old continent, barely two years after Hilda’s dark baptism, on a Halloween’s Blood Moon sixty-six years after Edward’s.</p><p>From the very beginning, it was easy for the redhead to notice that Shirley Jackson had a crush on Faustus, and his preference for Zelda had annoyed the other witch. Edward and Hilda were reason enough to stop the redhead from overthrowing the brunette back then. Once she was done with the Academy, almost a century since their first year, Zelda took off on her own, leaving everything they learned to call home behind. She longed to travel the world and get the Heaven out of Greendale.</p><p>The little town had asphyxiated her with its quietness. For centuries, Zelda had traveled the world. Until she fell prey to the warlocks. When she returned to Greendale, she settled behind Edward’s position and took the lesser classes from the ones he had offered her to teach. Shirley had been the one who had been thrown to the side for Zelda to step up. It wouldn’t be too rare if the witch hated all the Spellman’s alike since.</p><p>Yet, it’s not Shirley Jackson and her childish behavior that causes issues to Zelda’s first day, but Sabrina, who breaks yet another tradition. There was nothing written against a woman being a Top Boy. In her time, Zelda would’ve postulated herself had there not been a one-family-member per year policy. That, and to stop her parents from further torturing her into self-hate.</p><p>It’s not surprising for the redhead when she gets called to the Unholy priest’s office later that day. She expects the summoning and the chastising words for her niece’s latest transgression. What she didn’t expect was what happened moments later, when she found herself divested of her clothes, with a lash burning her back and tearing her skin. It outraged her when he pushed her over his desk, covering her mouth with a hand as he entered her with a satisfied grunt. As if she was nothing but a filthy plaything.</p><p>Zelda fixed herself after that, leaving his office without saying a word, or healing her wounds. The redhead was itching to get home to help Sabrina study. She had already paid the price. Truth to be told, the Spellman matriarch wanted her niece to crush Nicholas Scratch in the three events for the Top Boy position.</p><p>Later that night, when it seemed everyone had finally disappeared from the mortuary, Zelda transported herself to Mary’s cottage. “Day one back at school, and he’s already at it, Zelda?” Lilith had said, shaking her head in the disgust she felt towards Blackwood. Knowing perfectly well the redhead hadn’t enjoyed a second of it either. “Want me to heal them for you, or are you going just to collect them as prizes for whatever thing you believe you are achieving?”</p><p>“Mary…” Zelda said, willing to apologize. To ask for forgiveness, but the other witch wanted nothing of it. Lilith was going to help Zelda, nurse her to health, and then kiss her better. Maybe even ask her to stay the night. The demoness had been waiting for the redhead to show up since the lashing began... And then Zelda called her Mary.</p><p>As if the Dark Lord or the Fake God knew they were at a stand-off of sorts, they felt it. Falling forward to get a hold of any furniture, as the balance was disrupted once more.  “What the Heavens is that?” Zelda asked, frowning in confusion.</p><p>“Are you feeling it?” Lilith asked, getting a nod. The disturbance seemed to grow in energy too. While they try to understand what’s going on, the demoness considers for a moment that the redhead might felt it because of their current link. It’s easier to believe that than to think about the implications of not being it. Suddenly it stopped. “That couldn’t be good.”</p><p>“How is it that we feel this thing? This alteration on the equilibrium of powers, when there’s no reason for us to know of it, at all?” Zelda wondered.</p><p>“I don’t know, Zelda.” Early that day the three watchers, her father’s envoys who usually annoyed her whenever something had gotten loose from hell, had sent word about three Kings of Hell wandering that little town. Could this be related to Sabrina Spellman and the prophecy of the half-witch? “If only we could pinpoint what caused it…” Lilith said.</p><p>“I need to get back home, check upon my family. Are you going to be all right by yourself?” Zelda asked, coming closer to the brunette. The demoness felt the worry underneath her skin, the caring not only for her family but for Lilith herself, and couldn’t help but smile. “Yes, go to them.” Zelda nodded. A peck touched Lilith’s lips before the redhead disappeared again.</p><p>Everything was calm at the Spellman Mortuary and little did Zelda know about the confrontation of Sabrina and Ambrose, the angriness that had overtaken her niece, and how that caused things to fly around them.</p><p>The following morning, her niece had brought to her attention a demon attack. There was nothing Zelda could do about it, and despite how wrong it could’ve turned out, Sabrina had banished the demon back to hell. ‘Yet, the means she used, couldn’t be the destabilizing force Mary, and I felt,’ she thought.</p><p>While Zelda sits on the front pew, pretending to be all excited for the event. Lilith gets a better insight into what might have been wrong. Sabrina’s not behaving lovingly, as her Aunt Hilda puts it. The child’s mortal chums interrupt them; however, the demoness asks the blond Aunt to stay put in her new office. When she gets back, Hilda continues her explanation about flying objects and winds for her niece’s ire. It doesn't quite surprise her that it seems this happened around the same time they felt the disruptions.</p><p>Thankfully, it’s long after the younger Aunt left her office, that there’s a new set of lashing burning the skin of the demoness back. This time pain it’s almost unbearable. Zelda is most definitively not enjoying it. Lilith does all she can to accommodate. She dismisses a teacher’s assembly and tries to make Zelda feel loved and cherished. Yet she fails utterly when whipping turns into the betrayal burning her gut. She cries behind the locked door of her office and swears she’ll get rid of this thing.</p><p>That night, Zelda doesn’t visit her. The redhead won’t try to apologize because Lilith knows the entire thing was as unwanted for the Spellman matriarch as it was for her. She feels Zelda’s embarrassment burning in her blood and it worries her. The demoness knows the witch it’s a victim just like she herself was at some point -as the demoness deludes herself into thinking she isn’t anymore- and no matter how much it strikes her, Lilith begins to understand there’s no fault in being a victim, no matter how they walked themselves into it.</p><p>When the basketball team tryouts are in play, later the following day, it happens again. There’s a ripple on the balance that leaves Lilith breathless, and she can see where it is coming from. She feels the young Spellman magic taking over the entire court only with the words she seems to whisper. Until Sabrina rushes away while her mortal friends cheer the new achievement of the Putnam boy. Noticing this, Lilith tries to catch up to her. The first witch doesn’t really want to shove her further down the path anymore. Not when she fears Sabrina’s purpose is not to replace her but to overpass her.</p><p>As she walks down half-empty corridors, Lilith feels it, the distinct smell of Beelzebub. A mix of brimstone and decomposition. Remembering the angelic warning, she hurries to find them. The trespassing King has the girl bound. The demoness could easily get rid of him. Yet Sabrina is awake and can see her. The Dark Lord’s last sign pointed to his desire for her caring for the child. Lilith finds out she doesn’t quite hate being stuck as Mary Wardwell.</p><p>“Beelzebub, Lord of the Flies, I name you, and bind you here, before me, in Lucifer’s name, your Lord,” she says. The mother of demons doesn’t need the words, but Sabrina doesn’t know this. The demoness knew Beelzebub, before Lucifer himself did. That King was never the brightest of the Three. Noticing he had recognized her, Lilith raises her hand and banishes him to hell. She knows there’s no way Zelda hadn’t felt the usage of her power for the strength needed to send him back.</p><p>There was no time, though, to think about the redhead when the niece is there, half-freaked out. Lilith tells her some inane story about how she knew who Beelzebub was, and the child falls blindly for it. Then, she pries more information from the young girl. Sabrina defied Blackwood and his warlocks-are-better stupidity. The child had no idea how her Aunt had paid the price of her actions. Lilith feels the slight tremor of fear underneath her skin, just as Sabrina leaves her office. “What are you playing at now, Zelda?” she wonders.</p><p>Back at the Academy, Zelda too had felt the disruption. However breathless it leaves her, there still are further things at play as she prepares herself to confront Faustus Blackwood and use him as a pawn. It’s easier to say than do, as she juggles her fears and worries. Lying through her smile, she tells Faustus how much she enjoys what they are doing. The redhead always knew how to play, and it’s no surprise to her when she leaves him astoundingly quiet at his office. Her line is drawn. The eldest Spellman feels she can finally breathe until he reaches a decision.</p><p>Zelda hopes this mourning period he mentioned would last at least until the end of the quarter, or until she can make him do her bidding. Feeling more at ease than she had felt since the classes started, Zelda visit’s Mary that night. Although no words are exchanged, they hold on to each other for the night, not before they place several magical alarms to wake them when morning comes.</p><p>The conjuring event happens the next day, and it is then when Zelda discovers the origin of the unbalance. The two youngsters think they are working together. Yet, it’s Sabrina’s power, the one she feels taking the entire building.</p><p>What Sabrina says before completing their summoning makes some sense. Students and teachers freak out as the energies grow. Zelda looks unfazed even when the Kings appear. She knows she can take them with ease, and despite her unwillingness to admit it, so does Faustus. As the Kings speak, the redhead understands her niece is too far from seeing what’s really happening.</p><p>The Kings confirm there’s something more going on with her niece. But why? Why would they call her half-spawn witch? Not half-mortal as everyone else does? As they go on, they clarify things for Zelda. They want to stop Sabrina from ascending. To what exactly, the redhead doesn’t know, but it makes sense. If her niece is the creator of the unbalance, then how could they assert what chaos she could bring when some days the teen struggles with her moods.</p><p>Faustus makes a show of banishing the Kings, and Zelda knows it took him more of him than he let out. The redhead notices the way he’s panting until they reach his office. When he tries to approach her, later that day, charming her with what he’d done, she leaves.</p><p>Confused for what she’d seen and felt, she stops by the cottage. “Can we talk?” She asks and Lilith nods, it’s not often they do that. They are especially good at not talking. “What’s on your mind, Zelda?” She asks as the redhead takes the free chair next to her.</p><p>“It’s… I’m not sure I should tell you this, Mary.” The Spellman matriarch shakes her head. “Baby steps, right?” Lilith nods. “There was a Conjuring event at the Academy today. Around that time, you must have felt the disruption. It came from…”</p><p>“Sabrina,” Lilith sighs out, and it’s Zelda’s turn to frown. “I knew since the one before. Your niece was helping Theo Putnam to secure a spot on the basketball team. It sounds quite silly, I know, but the power she displayed… I didn’t know how to tell you that, or how to bring up I banished Beelzebub away from her.”</p><p>“I felt it. You… using your magic, I mean.”</p><p>“I thought you would feel it,” Lilith nods. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” she apologizes. Searching for Zelda’s hand, she squeezes reassuringly and searches the redhead’s eyes. There’s something in her blues’ that makes Zelda believe Mary’s saying the truth. “So, tell me, Zelda, what happened at the Conjuring?”</p><p>“They… She… summoned the three Kings of Hell. They said something that doesn’t quite add up. They called her half-spawn witch. Then they said the half-witch must not ascend. But ascend to what? Ascend why? I’m afraid, Mary, that this disruption we are feeling it’s for the worst and there won’t be anything we could do to stop it. How can I prevent my niece from ascending, if I don’t know what it means?”</p><p>“I’m not sure, Zelda, but I’ll do my best to find out,” Lilith says. This is more than they’ve spoken since they met and yet, they leave what they feel to the side. Feelings are still far from being spoken. When Zelda places another kiss on the inner side of her wrist, Lilith knows what she must do.</p><p>“As the humans say, if Lilith doesn’t go to the pit… Let’s make the pit come to Lilith,” she announces to no one once Zelda’s gone. Dressing up for the Dark Lord, she summons him. </p>
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<a name="section0021"><h2>21. Chapter 21</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I was certain I had posted this one last night... Seems I didn't.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>With fear burning underneath her skin, Lilith stands up to the Dark Lord. She dares to question him, and they agreed to a bet. Why is that she’s so fierce on betting her years on this beast? Why is it she’s still working under his grasp? She wonders. Especially now, when she’s seen kindness. She also has felt it, throbbing beneath her skin on a soothing hum, and melting her too, warming the icy walls she had built around herself, all coming from the coldish redhead.</p><p>Had not Bezaliel warned her about this fallen angel, about Lucifer’s tricks, before she had followed him to the pit the first time? Lilith wouldn’t ever admit to being so blind, so naïve as to have fallen for the tricks of a beautiful face, like some dumb mortal. Can she, like the half-witch had wanted, outwit the Dark Lord when she knows him better than anyone? She considers.</p><p>She knows with certainty that she will try to avoid Sabrina’s completing this task at all costs. The last thing the demoness wants is to have to accept his every whim again.</p><p>Unaware of this bet, Zelda finds herself questioning the reason the Dark Lord had tasked Sabrina with whatever he has tasked her. Especially when not once in her years had she been called to fulfill any task. Not once in her lifetime, her prayers to the Dark Lord or Lilith had been answered. Not even when she was burning at the stake the first time around.</p><p>What is it with her niece that has disrupted the balance and attracted the Dark Lord’s attention? As she worries, Zelda admits if only to herself, that she feels somewhat jealous of Sabrina.</p><p>It’s embarrassing though, to be jealous of the child who lost her parents before she could even remember them. Of the teen who refused to sign her name in a ceremony under a Halloween’s dark moon like all the Spellman’s before her, only to do it alone with the Dark Lord. To summon hellfire and save her town, unknowingly disrupting the equilibrium.  Zelda shakes herself. Her thoughts have nothing to do with Sabrina and all to do with her own deficiencies. Those things she learned not to dwell or show on the outside while keeping them closely (and painfully) buried at her core. Those things their parents had forced her to keep inside in favor of Edward, and to protect Hilda.</p><p>She bears all these thoughts with her as she seizes her new task. ‘The passion of Lucifer,’ a child’s play with so many alterations she finds appalling. The changes he has added alter everything that’s written in the scriptures. But she needs to do this as Faustus wants or risk losing her growing grasps on him.</p><p>To add to her annoyance on that day, Shirley sides with five other teachers to attempt to scare her. Zelda’s intuition was always on point and it’s easy for her to notice there’s something wrong, and move away before the statue falls to the ground. ‘Six against me? Hm, a bit unfair for them,’ Zelda thinks. She won’t fall for these childish plays. She has enough on her plate as it was and refuses to waste power or thoughts on some half-witted witch who can’t take a loss. Not when there was so much at stake. Not when she had survived far worse on her own.</p><p>Then the witch has the indecency of transporting her familiar to her throat, trying to make a fool of Zelda in front of the students. The redhead gets over it quickly, not even giving it much attention to show that these childish games can’t disturb her and warns them from attempting it themselves 'or else...' However, she’s pass peeved and while she thinks this familiar will make a mildly good meal, perhaps a little short for the Spellman’s number, Zelda pries the situation of any guarding spells Shirley could have. The redhead’s decadently happy when she finds none.</p><p>As soon as she reaches the mortuary, Ambrose gives her an envelope with her name written on it. A brief note from Mary, asking her not to stop by her cottage unless she searches for her. The teacher mentions something about working on trying to find out what’s happening with them and how that might take her out of Greendale for a considerable amount of time the following nights. Zelda plops herself on the library’s couch, feeling disappointment burning on her. Until it happens again, that annoying feeling of powers being summoned disrupting the ubiquitous equilibrium that existed. It leaves her gasping for air. Zelda wonders what could’ve caused Sabrina to lose control over her powers, again.</p><p>Lilith knows. The demoness is aware the teen is playing a game of wills with the Dark Lord. She knows because she’s the one who caused it and now half-regrets it; although she hopes Sabrina won’t fall for it. The demoness hopes for Lucifer to confess why the child is so capable of altering the very base of the things that form the creation as its whole.</p><p>‘He cannot answer what he doesn’t know,’ Bezaliel’s voice reaches her mind just as Sabrina leaves the mortal shop after her outburst. At least, she had done nothing damming. Past the vibrating feelings coursing through the three of them before because of the unbalance she’d created. ‘One more day to live free,’ Lilith thinks.</p><p>Another night goes by, with Zelda locked inside the Spellman’s library searching for answers she knows aren’t there. There are a bunch of new books she’d had manipulated Cassius into showing her. The redhead had just transported them to the mortuary, erasing all traces of her search before she returned home. The Spellman matriarch never gets to bed, too focused on getting to the end of it (any of the ‘it’ will do by now) once and for all.</p><p>Sabrina’s scream interrupts her morning reading, but when they reach her room, the teen excuses it as a nightmare. Zelda eyes her warily, but her niece has been under her glare so many times she seems unaffected by it. “I’ll be late for school,” Sabrina says, making her way between her two Aunties.</p><p>“Hildie?” She says, Hilda turns surprised at the use of her old nickname. “I need your help with my message to Shirley,” Zelda states, and her younger sister beams at her.</p><p>“I’m sure you already know if she has some wards?”  Hilda inquires with a smile. The eldest Spellman snorts. “She has none, the batwit won’t see it coming,” she grins mischievously. “It must be something soft, Hilda. Nothing that<em> I</em> would do,” Zelda adds cryptically, but Hilda understands.</p><p>“No worries, Zelds… Nothing that poppet magick can’t solve.” Hilda offers, liking their hands and dragging Zelda along to do what they need.</p><p>The younger sister knows something had happened to Zelda in her traveling days. Something that had left her beyond shocked. Yes, their parents had never made it easy for the redhead. They were always trying to make her control her powers, and the fire running inside her, molding her to be something she was not.  They wanted her to be softer, like Hilda herself had been. Easier to control, as Edward had been.</p><p>Hilda knows it’s their parents and not the quietness of Greendale that made Zelda flee their house and all but disappear on them for one hundred and eighty-eight years. Returning only for a few months, every few years, and fading again when she found things had changed little. She remained longer for Ambrose, Hilda knew. When the youngling was visiting, Zelda would always stay for as long as he remained. Shouldering her burden with ease, showing only to the youngest Spellman, at that time, some parts of herself she didn’t show to anyone anymore. Everyone else was kept out, everything else was kept in. Their parents had made sure to build Zelda Spellman like that.</p><p>Sabrina’s outburst with Ambrose, a few days earlier, had reminded Hilda of a young Zelda. Her sister, back then dark-haired, was a lot worse than what she witnessed with the cousins. The blonde Aunt remembered the howling winds, the flying objects, the candles burning ablaze, flames growing larger than they should, the thunders roaring, and the rays falling in nearby trees whenever Zelda lost control of her temper. ‘Her blood pressure,’ their parents called it.</p><p>Hilda always wondered where all that strength came from. Although the Spellman line had always been one comprising of great Witches, there was nothing in their lineage that could explain the force of nature that Zelda was. She knew this for her own quest to learn more about it. Because she wanted to be powerful, like Zelda.</p><p>Growing up, Hildegard had been jealous of the way Zelda commanded her energies and wielded her magic with such ease. But seeing what it had cost her, knowing what she knew, how they had hidden for nine years after Zelda's dark baptism. How that night added to the ever-growing pressure their parents put on her redhead sister to keep it all in... Hilda was sure she wouldn’t want to fit Zelda’s shoes at all.</p><p>Hilda can’t remember a day where their parents told Zelda they loved her or even how proud they were of her. No, she remembers exactly the opposite. And even when her intelligence and beauty were praised by outsiders, their parents couldn’t help but be disgusted by the fact that she wouldn’t be baptized on a blood moon, let alone a full moon night. Breaking yet another mold into the Spellman’s traditions. Zelda carried the disappointment she always was for them with the coldness she portrayed, even the night of her Dark Baptism.</p><p>The entire coven was there, as they undressed Zelda. Her alabaster skin glowing even under the darkness of the new moon. Dark hair fell curling above the low of her back, she offered her hand undoubtedly. She never hissed when the cut was made, too accustomed to the pain even at sixteen. Their priest placed her hand above the Book of the Beast, her blood dripped. Even after all this time, and being just nine by then, Hilda remembers the sound the bloody drop made when in contact with the paper. As if time had slowed down, the rustling winds, the howling hounds, the blood-red roses, mugwort, and lavenders sprung to life at the clearing. How the moon inexplicably had become not only a full one but a blood moon.</p><p>The moon shone over Zelda and her hair turned to the same orangey shade the celestial body was shining down on her. Her name was signed away, and as if it was all a mirage, time picked up again. The new moon was back in heaven, and there was no howling, no winds, no plants anymore. The only sign that what she’d seen had been true was Zelda’s rose gold hair.</p><p>Their High Priest had appeared into their home the next day and asked their parents to leave the town and never return. Not with<em> that</em> witch. Not with whatever omen she was carrying.</p><p>Shaking herself out of her memories, she looked up to her currently sewing sister and smiled. “Zelds?” She got a hum as an answer. “This certainly brings back memories, doesn’t it?” Hilda grinned.</p><p>“Your poppets were always far better than mine, Hilda. We both know I’m helpless with these,” Zelda answered mechanically. Their mother’s words. Hilda grimaced, if they were honest there was only one thing the redhead was bad at, and it was gardening. She had no patience for it, mostly because it was the chore their parents always seemed to find for her. To keep her away.</p><p>Childhood memories, for Zelda, are plagued by days of listening just to how much worse she was than Hilda at anything that counted, and how much she wasn’t Edward. How much she wasn’t a man, and how useless she was as a woman.</p><p>“We both know that’s not true, Zelds,” she said, placing a hand over the stilled hand. “Your poppets were beautiful. Did I ever tell you how sorry I was that mother and father treated you the way they did?” Zelda fought her emotions, barely managing to keep them from her sister.</p><p>“It wasn’t your fault, Hilda. I understand I disrupted their plans in the worst possible way, and it seems I became quite adept at doing that with everyone’s plans.” She grimaced, continuing with her work.</p><p>“Zelds?” Another humming answer. “Would you ever tell me what happened that made you return to Greendale and pretend you are not... that you aren’t, that you don't carry the magic you have?” She risks, knowing she could be killed for this.</p><p>“Only if I have no other choice, Hilda. Besides, there’s no point in dwelling on the past. It’s gone. It happened and there’s nothing you or anyone can do to change it. We are here now, aren’t we? Things are working out, aren’t they?”</p><p>“I guess,” Hilda shrugged. With one more stitch, Zelda deemed the conversation closed and asked the instructions on the poppet magick that would work to settle her issue with Shirley Jackson. It works easily, and it’s dull enough that won’t raise any suspicions about her skills. Yet, she can see the additional layer of respect (and not fear) on the students as she walks around the Academy. She makes a mental note to thank Hilda for this.</p><p>Tangled in her own emotions, she doesn’t see or feel the brunette until there’s a considerable amount of rage burning beneath her skin around the witching hour that night. Zelda wants to pop herself in the cottage and see to calm the storm brewing inside the teacher, but she remembers the note and stays put even if everything tells her she should be there, holding her.</p><p>Lilith’s there, the following night at the play. To get the last nail to her heart from the one person the demoness once thought she loved. That Sabrina is on stage, acting like her, being ‘Lilith’ and that’s a true knife in her broken heart. Her shame grows. Not only because her foolishness is being portrayed for all to see, but for this can’t be anything else than a show of His power. On stage, Sabrina is being offered to rule by Lucifer’s side. To become his Queen.</p><p>Zelda feels her, the loud humming of Mary being near. The redhead also feels despair and overwhelming sadness beyond anything she had ever felt. The matriarch covers it all with the rapt attention she’s pretending to maintain on the play. She fights the tears that threaten to spill. Yet, no matter how wonderful actors Sabrina and Nicholas are, tears aren’t welling up for them. The redhead just wants to find Mary and learn why is it she’s on the brink of desperate depression. Falling into an abyss that, despite appearances, Zelda knows all too well.</p><p>Her heart breaks into pieces with the teacher's pain, yet she can’t refuse the Academy after-party. So, keeping inane conversations, the eldest Spellman buries herself between a hookah, alcohol, and her cigarette. They do nothing to quench the ache boiling underneath her skin. There’s something else, too, rage and the disgusting feeling of humiliation she reckons. More things that Zelda carries inside too, all too damn well acquainted with them. Tattooed in her soul since her childhood. Scars still scabbing, other ones barely stitched together by a thin thread.</p><p>It’s past the witching hour when the party dwindles, and she finds herself knocking on Mary’s door. This time, Zelda knows why she has not teleported herself inside. She wants to give the woman a chance to pretend she’s not there if she wants to. But the door is opened, and a disheveled looking brunette stands at the other side.</p><p>Zelda it’s about to say something when she’s stopped by a raising hand, and the redhead wonders if she has interrupted something. Closing the door on Zelda’s nose, Lilith dispatches Stolas to the other room. He flies to the perch she has for him there and she locks her resurrected familiar inside. The demoness knew some resurrected people who weren’t as bad, as that son of her father, he was nice. Yet, as the mother of demons, she also knew some that ended up worse. She won’t risk her.</p><p>It’s the humming of the redhead’s proximity that makes Lilith feel a bit confident. The woman had understood what the first witch hadn’t said, and she finds that oddly comforting. The demoness takes a deep breath, finally opening her front door. Her hand searches for leather-encased ones, and she pulls the woman close. Lips collide eagerly against each other, yet it’s soft and full of brokenness. Lilith finds herself being tightly encompassed in Zelda’s arms. As if she understands what’s going on in her head. As if there’s a chance that someone really knows what her life was like.</p><p>A salty tear mingles between their lips, and Zelda stops. Breaking the kiss and resting her forehead against the brunette’s, still not letting her go. One hand searches Mary’s face blindly, feeling the trail of tears before cleaning them away.</p><p>“Tell me what you need,” Zelda whispers throatily, words heavy with feelings.</p><p>“Hold me… please…” And without a hint of judgment, that’s exactly what Zelda does. </p>
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<a name="section0022"><h2>22. Chapter 22</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They don’t talk (they rarely do). They don’t ask. They don’t tell. They both know the risk of starting a conversation is having to disclose on an equal measure the reason they seem so good at understanding each other. It’s beyond risky, they assess, to confess your deep, dark thoughts, when it only will help to strengthen the bonds of this relationship they don’t trust in, they don’t want, yet most definitively, they need.</p><p>Sleep, despite all, comes rather easily. As they lay almost as bare as their shared feelings under their skins. The warmth flooding from the other body, the reassurance, the peace, (the security that no harm will come to them as long they are together, but they don’t dwell on this) they work better than any tea or potion even Hilda could concoct.</p><p>Zelda’s hands are, as Blackwood would say, hell sent. The one on Lilith’s back, it’s soft, her nails raising goosebumps on her skin. A contrast to the lashing she feels time and time again burning their backs. The demoness finds herself snuggling even closer to the redhead, almost melting over the expanse of pale warmth, and she can’t help but feel a tug at her heart at the way she’s being held. So preciously. So carefully.</p><p>The brunette raises her head slightly just to observe her. Zelda has her eyes closed, her mouth is slightly parted, and her brow furrowed. However, it’s not the stern image she usually portrays, Lilith reckons. Green eyes flutter open under her gaze, and she can’t help the tiny smile that breaks out. Red lips curl slightly upwards as an answer.</p><p>‘She’s here. She understands.’ They both think.</p><p>A pale hand travels upwards to Lilith’s cheek. While the other one keeps tracing soothing patterns in her back. A protection sigil, the demoness realizes. Yet, she’s distracted by the other hand, the one that touches her cheek in veneration. A soft kiss is placed on her forehead and the mother of demons is surprised by the sound that leaves her mouth. A whimper of all the things.</p><p>Zelda smiles at this, her heart racing in her ears. They lie at an awkward angle. Despite that, Lilith cranes her neck upwards and her own hand snakes towards the rose gold silk of the witch’s hair, before trying to accommodate a kiss.  It’s too short to be anything more than a goodnight peck, however powerful and reassuring it is. Eyes shimmer in the dark, glowing with feelings and everything they don’t speak of. (They won’t speak of)</p><p>‘One day, perhaps,’ they both think. ‘Once there’s no mystery as to why we can lie like this, bonding over unknown experiences that we can feel rushing through us.’ As eyes unlock from each other’s they feel there was a vow passing between them. To keep this, whatever it is, as pure as it’s been so far. As the calm after the storm.</p><p>Sleep claims the tired minds, and the astral realm claims their souls. There’s carefreeness in there. There’s everything they haven’t felt beyond each other’s arms and so much more that they can’t even put words to it. Their dreams are filled with love, that permeates through their bodies and finally to each other. For once, they don’t fight it as it heals them in ways they don’t quite understand.</p><p>Lilith wakes up first the next morning and traces the contours of Zelda’s face with a timid finger as if committing to memory this moment. The redhead leaves out a contented sigh. Her lids fight to remain closed. There’s a soft moan, coming from both as Zelda stretches in bed and brings with her the glorious body plastered half over her.</p><p>“Good morning,” the Spellman witch mumbles out and Lilith smiles brightly. It’s so endearing to watch her like this. The first witch can’t help but hate Blackwood a little more for abusing her, no matter how Zelda seems to enjoy some of the violence of it. “Morning,” the demoness answers, in the same way.</p><p>“We should get ready,” the mother of demons says, but she doesn’t move from where she is. The Spellman matriarch hums in agreement, but only presses her closer and tightens her grasp on the brunette. It’s time what breaks them apart. Time running through their fingers faster than they desire. “I’m going to be late,” the demoness whispers. She wants to say, ‘To heaven with Baxter High, they can survive a day without me!’ but what Lilith doesn’t want is to add any other layer of worry anywhere and she still has to free Stolas from the guest room.</p><p>The demoness is so lost in her thoughts she doesn’t see the mischievous smile on Zelda’s face. Until she’s unceremoniously thrown fully to her back and she feels the weight of the redhead straddling her hips. Lips, gloriously, soft lips, find her neck, leaving small bites, and peppering kisses all over the place. Eliciting sounds from her that the demoness can’t contain even if she tries. Just when she decides she wants the witch’s expert mouth everywhere, Zelda stops.</p><p>“Mary?” She asks, searching for permission to go on. Yet, managing to bring back the mountain of secrets Lilith is hiding from her. It’s not her fault, though, how could Zelda know?</p><p>There’s doubt in the green eyes, and something else. As if the redhead is trying to decide if she should continue or not, despite all the clues the teacher’s body is giving her, it’s the slight terror in the blue eyes that stops her. Lilith sighs. “We are going to be late,” the brunette whispers, squirming out from under the redhead.</p><p>It kills Lilith that she can feel the disappointment, the rejection, and the awful self-loathe bubbling under her skin, and not coming from her. It’s the third time she rejects her or stops their advance. Although the demoness has a good reason; she knows it doesn’t prevent the redhead to swim in an ocean of her faults and self-deprecation. Suckling her lower lip, Lilith walks to her and pulls her up from the place she had left her. A tight, heartfelt embrace is the next thing that comes.</p><p>“It’s not you, Zelda… At’s cliche as it might sound, it is me,” Lilith whispers. “I can’t go further than this, even if I want to, and hell would freeze over if I say you don’t ignite a myriad of things inside me. I want you, Zelda. I’m terrified of how much I want to feel you, taste you, have you in wherever way I can. However, it’s me, the one who can’t move forward…” She rests her forehead on the redhead’s one, a hand caressing the alabaster skin of her cheeks, clearing away the moist trail of tears she provoked. “Not yet... but someday.”</p><p>And there it is, the understanding that Lilith longs for, shinning in Zelda’s eyes as she searches in them. Perhaps, the redhead doesn’t quite understand what is it that stop Lilith’s from moving forward, to the more intimate physicality of it all, when they have crossed beyond any other emotionally intimate bonds there are... But Zelda too has her guards high. No matter how this woman cracks them and squeeze herself past her barriers.</p><p>“Then we go at your pace,” Zelda states in a voice that leaves no room to question it. “There’s no need for explanations. They will come on its due time if they ever need to come,” she adds because she too is wary of the moment they’ll start to speak. Petrified for the things she must disclose herself. “Just know this, I’m absolutely terrified too. I’m not like this with anyone else. I’ve never been this vulnerable in front of anyone. I’ve never been this soft and caring with anyone, not even Sabrina… You can break me, worse than anyone else can… and yet, here I am standing almost bare in front of you.”</p><p>Lilith kisses her for it. There are so many truths in what little they exchange that it’s always surprising to the demoness to find herself at the end of something like that. “We go at our pace, dear. Our own time. We set our own rules. I don’t want you to be less than you, and I don’t want to be less than me. Not when you can feel my struggle, and I can feel yours,” she tells her and it’s, by far, the most honest Lilith has ever been with anyone since she'd fleed from her Father’s garden.</p><p>“I can agree to that,” Zelda nodded, pecking her lips once more. “No matter how appealing this sounds, I must dress and get home. I’m fairly certain you are also late, Principal Wardwell,” she grins, making the demoness laugh at this.</p><p>They can’t help the silly smiles on their faces. But for sure, they try to keep them hidden for the rest of the day. Somehow, after that, they work out a schedule of sorts. New books pile up at Mary’s cottage, straight from inside the Academy walls, and they pour into them, devouring them along with wine, whiskey, tea, or coffee. Boxes of cigarettes, worn filters, and ashes, now a common part of Lilith’s garbage. They read until all they can see is blurry letters, and they kiss until all that remains is to cross the one line they aren’t crossing. The one that Lilith still draws.</p><p>Most nights, Zelda gets back to the mortuary to keep some semblance of a routine and try to keep her family out of her life. They don’t know a thing about this blossoming thing she’s developing in Mary Wardwell’s arms. At most, they think she despises the schoolmarm thanks to the few times she’d meddled with Sabrina’s. They believe she’s with Blackwood, and despite Edward’s warnings, they try to be happy for her, since Zelda does seem livelier.</p><p>Everything goes well until Lupercalia approaches and things go sour for the couple. Zelda’s thrilled by the event, one she had always loved. She plans to use the lust and passion flowing from all the young witches that attend the academy to ‘give in’ into a night of passion with Blackwood. To keep him where she wants him.</p><p>Zelda doesn’t know that Lilith had been considering just act out on those same lustful feelings that came with the excess of hormones in the environment. To finally give in, no matter if the name the redhead would be screaming was ‘Mary’. However, the demoness can’t find fault in Zelda’s logic. The mother of demons still can’t tell her who she is or why she knows she shouldn’t pursue a relationship with Faustus. Mostly because the brunette knows she falls in the same line. A mountain high of lies and reasons Zelda should keep away from her floods Lilith’s mind as the redhead paces in front of her, explaining her plan. Explaining herself.</p><p>“Darling, I understand… Truthfully, Zelda, do what you need to do… We agreed to that… And yes, I see how giving in one night will attach him to you further…” The mother of demons struggles with the words, but she finds the strength to say them. Besides, it’s been weeks since they felt any ripple on the balance, and their connection was still steady. Thus, Lilith knows what to expect. The betrayal flooding her without no reason other than the redhead doing things the demoness still hadn’t allowed Zelda to do to her, or that she hadn’t allowed herself to do with the redhead.</p><p>“Are you sure?” The Spellman witch asks nonetheless because no matter how afraid she is of committing to this woman, she’s terrified of losing her. Lilith kisses her, then. It’s hungry, passionate and they fall into each other forgetting everything about the books, the Lupercalia, and any other thing beyond the way they feel. The warmth spreading across two bodies, passion igniting every cell, flames surrounding them burning high, winds howling outside, and there are even hounds howling as they collide wantonly.  “Mary,” Zelda whispers in Lilith’s ear as the demoness's hands go lower than ever before. The name on her ear stopping her cold.</p><p>The eldest Spellman prides herself at not being dumb, she never was and hopes she would never be found as one. She understands that’s the name she uses that stops them from moving forward. From crossing the line that’s been drawn. Zelda sits back, bringing the demoness with her. She clears away the hair obstructing her view of the baby blues she loves, and she finally admits that’s what this is. Love.</p><p>No matter how much they keep denying it. No matter how much they try to blame it on the connection of their magics. She knows -and maybe the teacher knows too- that what keeps binding them together is that silly feeling they don’t want to feel.</p><p>Zelda bites her lower lip, suckling it between her teeth, and caressing hard cheeks with soft hands. Memorizing every inch of the brunette in front of her. “I don’t care about your name. You can be called Mary, Regina, or I don’t know, something classic, like Viola, or Margaret. It’s not your name that I’m... attached to. It’s you, the woman who carries it. The woman behind it. Not the whatever lies you have spread to be able to teach at Baxter High as my brother asked you.”</p><p>Lilith takes a deep breath, it’s not just the name though. It’s the lies, it’s the things she keeps hidden. It’s her past. It’s the fact that she’s not a witch, but the first witch and a demon. That she doesn't belong to herself, but the Dark Lord.</p><p>“You don’t understand, Zelda. It’s not only that…” Lilith sighs, her eyes close as she touches the redhead’s forehead with her own. “I’m committed to the Dark Lord. I’m his.”</p><p>“So am I…” Zelda scoffs. “And Hilda, and Sabrina, and Ambrose… and the whole damn Church of Night, and the Church of Shadows, or whatever name the one you were excommunicated from had.” The demoness wants to cry at this, a few tears do escape her eyes and are promptly cleared away by soft thumbs. Worried greens find tortured blues before Zelda sighs. “Whenever you are ready, love. I’ll wait for you, whatever name you have. Besides, I can call you love, darling, or any other pet name you feel comfortable with. I don’t have to call you Mary. I just do, because that’s the name you gave me.”</p><p>The demoness nods, dumbfounded. She’s taken aback by the passion of Zelda’s words, for the truth she finds behind green eyes. Lilith kisses her, but this time it’s the redhead, the one that breaks the kiss away. “But not tonight, love. It would be too bittersweet to cross the line just so close after you refused it so vehemently.”  Zelda stands up and offers her a hand. The redhead pulls her up and leads the way to the room. They go about their night in the same way they always seem to do until they end up cuddling in the dark.</p><p>“Do you really mean it?” Lilith asks in a terrified whisper that Zelda feels beneath her skin. As she does, the demoness can’t help but relax to the loving feeling that comes bubbling under her skin, from the redhead.</p><p> “Every word, darling, every one of them.” </p>
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<a name="section0023"><h2>23. Chapter 23</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s the first Tuesday after that night at Mary’s cottage, that the Lupercalia events start. Zelda had offered herself as a chaperone, if only because she knows the High Priest had to be there to oversee it. Faustus’s charming, more so now than he had been ever before when tries to woo her and fails dramatically. Blackwood doesn’t stand a chance to make her love him. That place in her heart has been overhauled and occupied for the first time in her life by the most unexpected of the witches.</p><p>Yet, she’s all smiles and pleasantries as, standing right beside him at the mezzanine, she watches the witches dancing around the pole to be matched. That night, she showers two times before she heads to Lilith’s cottage. The redhead can still smell his perfume. Therefore, the moment that the brunette’s arms are opened in front of her, Zelda clings to her tightly. The Spellman matriarch calls her love, dear, sweetheart, or even darling now, carefully threading the minefield that their nights can become if she triggers whatever issues that linger in the brunette when she calls her Mary when they are alone.</p><p>The demoness kisses her, wondering if a name like her own could change things so poorly for them. If really her history would have so much weight when the bonds between them are already settling, burning inside them with every passed second that ticks away while they cuddle in her bed. Solidifying itself in the silence of their arms, and the softness of their passionate kisses. She doesn’t fall for it, though, and she praises herself for her self-control because truthfully, they both know just how desperate they feel about moving forward and explore the little that’s left to be colonized by desperate mouths searing frantic kisses on any available strip of bare skin.</p><p>Still unable to untangle herself from the other woman, Zelda excuses herself the early next morning. With her face hidden in the curve of Lilith’s neck, she warns her she won’t be coming to her that night. The redhead needs to get into the right state of mind to survive the following one and knows she won’t be able to if memories of holding the teacher are too fresh on her mind. Lilith understands it. She lets the Spellman witch go, but not before devouring her mouth, marking every inch of it as hers, burning the redhead's body with the trails of her warm hand on whatever piece of bare skin she finds. Her hands itching to go south, to give in, to give her what she wants, and yet, once more, Lilith stops herself.</p><p>The redhead doesn’t complain, instead wonders what kind of sick relationship the brunette had before, since she can endure the brunt of lashings with ease, but moving forth in their intimacy takes more of her than she’s willing to word out. Zelda herself has never had a healthy relationship with anyone. This one with the teacher is the closest she’s come from one, and it really can’t be that healthy. Despite it all, she still has trust issues, and the brunette has intimacy ones.  When the Spellman witch still can fuck her High Priest under the cover of the night to reassure her position. To try to restore her family name, to keep her niece protected, while the other witch must stay to the side and feel whatever Zelda is feeling. It’s not healthy, and it’s hardly fair. Yet, the brunette doesn’t complain.</p><p>The second night of Lupercalia comes faster than she hopes, and the Spellman matriarch finds herself preparing a basket for Blackwood and her. Zelda takes him to the side, and she lays with him on the ground like so many nights of her youth before. She has memories of many Lupercalias spent with Faustus Blackwood. Back then, her brother’s tutor. Riding him to oblivion and then laughing at his expression when someone else joined them to enjoy the lustful night of anything but unholy abstinence.</p><p>This one, however, it’s far from the carefree memories of her younger years. This night it’s about power, control, and getting back what once belonged to the Spellman clan. With a sideline of getting what once Edward agreed, it should’ve been hers. It’s the howling of a wolf too close to where they are, what gracefully stops them from more than a heated kiss that has nothing on the several she’s shared with the teacher.</p><p>Zelda doesn’t dwell on how is Mary the one in her thoughts as her lips moved on Faustus’, and by the time they stop, she’s still completely dressed. They stand up and round the woods, taking different paths. They are the chaperones, after all, they need to ensure the safety of the kids. The redhead wonders as she walks alone if this is the brunette’s doing to prevent her from what she was about to do.</p><p>Even if she knows nothing had happened between Zelda and Faustus the previous night -she felt no betrayal- Lilith finds herself angry with the hearts and cupids that litter the school. Whoever had done it had the gall to fill her office with these childish mortal things (again), and she’s ready to burn them all to a crisp. Then it happens, she gets the surprise of a lifetime…</p><p>“A fiancé?” the demoness asks to no one, even if Stolas is perched in her office. “What am I supposed to do with a fiancé?” She continues. Her familiar recommends a clean death, and Lilith must agree. She’ll kill him back at the cottage and no one would ever be the wiser. ‘And the Spellman woman?’ Stolas has the gall to ask her then. The mother of demons waves him off, annoyed. “She’s a mean to learn about Sabrina, while I’m stuck at this spinster schoolmarm pretense. She hardly is of importance,” Lilith dismisses, knowing that Zelda is far more than just it. The demoness is in love with that witch, and she’ll be damned if her familiar finds out about it. She keeps Stolas as far away from Zelda Spellman as she can. ‘Maybe I can use this mortal, if that’s what he is, to test where Stolas loyalties truly lie.’ She thinks.</p><p>After an afternoon helping Hilda gain the confidence to face the strange shop owner she fancies, the redhead watches her sister go. She remains at the mortuary enough to dispatch her niece. With no further thought, Zelda transports herself to the cottage and finds it filled with flowers. Candles are burning around the room, and the fire is dimmed in the hearth. She frowns in confusion. The eldest Spellman knows that as Principal, Mary must chaperone the sweetheart dance at Baxter High. Yet, the noise in the kitchen catches her attention.</p><p>There’s a man in there, he seems to be responsible for the clattering of kitchen cookware, and she stops utterly confused by this. As a witch, Zelda had always felt the magic from any other magical being that she’d met during her lifetime; however, her instinct was always quite difficult to trick. Thus, when she doesn’t feel any magic coming from him, she reckons this is a mortal. ‘Maybe a trespasser?’ She considers as she conjures a knife from the countertop, and she’s about to hit him when he turns around.</p><p>“Oh, hi there… I guess I was too preoccupied to hear the door or your car for that matter. I believe we haven’t met? I’m Adam Masters,” He smiles, drying his hand with a towel from the rack. Zelda hides the hand holding the knife behind her back. The familiarity with which the man moves around takes her off guard.  Mary, the hum underneath her skin tells her, is alive and at least that’s some relief.</p><p>“Zelda?” Lilith calls, searching for the redhead. She finds her with her back towards her, keeping a kitchen knife clenched in her hand. Green eyes trained on Adam, and her brow furrowed, showcasing the disconcert that Lilith feels under her skin coming from her.</p><p>“Oh, you are ready, honey?” Adam asks the teacher and walks until she’s engulfed in a side embrace. “Zelda, you’ve said? I didn’t know you had any friends called like that, sweetheart,” he smiles again, and truly, the redhead wants to use the knife if only by the way he’s touching her Mary.</p><p>“Ah, we got closer at the end of last year,” Lilith provides, an apologetic look on her face directed at the redhead. Blue eyes wide, searching green and hoping she feels how sorry she is about this surprise. There’s also Stolas, who she knows it’s keeping his watch from his perch in the living room. “Zelda is the Aunt of one of my favorite students. We keep in touch since her niece has left our school in search of a brighter future at a private academy. Sabrina comes back from time to time and visits Baxter High. Zelda, this is Adam…” She struggles with the next words, knowing fully well the trepidation that was already growing on the redhead’s blood. “My fiancé.”</p><p>“Fiance?” Zelda's frown deepens in confusion. She thinks back to what Mary had told them when she’d introduced herself. The redhead guesses this must be the mortal that started the brunette’s path to ex-communication. “I’m sorry to have interrupted you. I shall get back to my own plans then,” the Spellman witch says, a bit more harshly than she wanted to. A lot more disheartened than intended. She rushes to the front door.</p><p>“Zelda, wait!” Lilith calls, rushing to her and making her stop right before she crosses the threshold.  The redhead stops. Turning around to face her, she gives the brunette a once-over and a half-smile. “You look gorgeous tonight, love,” Zelda lets out, biting her lower lip and fighting tears she does know -but won’t admit- why are threatening to fall. An icy hand reaches for the memorized sharp cheek and traces its contours tenderly. Lilith can help but lean into the touch. “Have fun at the dance, darling.”</p><p>The moment her hand falls away from her face, the demoness feels cold sweeping through her bones. She braces herself for the self-loathe, rage, and despair that surely will follow. The door is barely closed behind her when Zelda teleports back home.  It doesn’t quite surprise Lilith when her own heart breaks this time around.</p><p>She remains looking at the closed door until she feels warm hands surrounding her. Clenching her jaw and closing her eyes to prevent the tears that need to fall but won’t be allowed to, she feels chapped lips on the skin of her cheek. Despite the delicacy of the action, it angers her. Not because he dared, but because he stained the memory of Zelda’s hand on her cheek.</p><p>“Your friend is gone?” Adam asks. She can only nod. “Huh, you have to ask her who’s her mechanic. Her car did not make any sound,” he says. His words sound utterly ridiculous in her ears. Lilith would’ve said something if she could, but the words die in her throat as the anguish boils underneath her skin.</p><p>Zelda drowns herself, her sorrow and guilt, under more than just a nightcap. She can’t bring herself to read when it reminds her of the brunette and the many shared nights. She feels another pang of jealousy, as she remembers the way he had brought her Mary close and secured her in his arms.</p><p>It makes it worse that she can’t say anything about it without being a hypocrite. She can’t complain about Mary having someone else when there’s also Faustus in her life. She’s torn. Zelda wants to blame it on the lie, on the omission of something so binding, like a fiancé. But truly, she knows she’s jealous.</p><p>The redhead drags herself to bed when she assesses she’s too drunk to feel anymore. However, she still does. She screeches into her pillow when there’s betrayal burning inside her. Cutting her like a warm knife. The witch doesn’t understand where it comes from at first and then; she remembers. There’s a man in Mary’s house, there’s arousal simmering under her skin. It’s not so hard to piece this new feeling together with what must be happening there.</p><p>Barely covered by her silk nightgown, the redhead teleports herself to the outside of the cottage. She sees them herself. Lilith knows she’s there, her blood humming with her proximity. Her blue eyes search the around and lock into green eyes. Despite all the lust and the breathtaking betrayal running underneath Zelda’s skin, she also feels the sorrow. Mary’s sorrow.</p><p>By the look the brunette gives her, the redhead knows the teacher knew this feeling of betrayal would’ve happened. It’s not so hard to infer that, besides the whipping, her pain, and embarrassment, Mary too, felt the betrayal running underneath her skin. Marking beyond words the extent of their connection. Zelda wonders if this feeling that has her breathless, is the reason the excommunicated witch had teleported herself to Faustus's office when she did. Shame threatens to drown her as the redhead disappears into the night before she has time to see more.</p><p>The next day, when Faustus proposes, it’s not her family luster or gaining power about what she thinks of, but of blue eyes looking at her lovingly. Of a warm body clinging to hers and piecing her together, even if the teacher seems unaware of the extent of her doings. Zelda thinks of the one woman she loves. Yet, she knows exactly what she’ll answer.</p>
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<a name="section0024"><h2>24. Chapter 24</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>With the box containing turtle-dove hearts in her hands, Zelda rushes to the Academy’s bathroom, checking if it’s empty, and locks the door before lets herself fall into a heap against the door. She fights the crushing emotions this box brings into her soul and tries to collect herself the best she can. Standing up tall, she looks at her reflection. Sometimes it surprises her how easily she can appear as collected and cold as everyone sees her when she’s beyond falling apart at the seams. Finally, shaking her head, the redhead unlocks the door. When she takes the step across the threshold, she takes herself outside Mary’s cottage, forgetting everything else including her winter coat.</p><p>Zelda needs her to be the first to know. She wants Mary to stop her from doing this, and yet, she hopes for encouraging words about how she should take what she deserves. ‘It’s time for witches to step up and get a High priestess, don’t you think?’ The brunette had said once, and Zelda had chuckled at it. ‘Don’t laugh, Zelda. It’s about time! Even mortal females have been empowering themselves across the globe. Why we witches would’ve lesser? Besides, you’ll do a fine job, darling,’ she had added before Zelda had all but pounced on top of her. They had rolled over the floor, forgetting everything about the silly conversation they were having as their world closed around them with every kiss.</p><p>Now, as the cottage’s door is opened, she doesn’t find playful blue eyes but confused dull ones. “Zelda? Right? Did you walk with this awful weather?” Adam inquires, peering over her shoulders and finding no means of transportation. Zelda frowns, ‘doesn’t this man know his fiancée is a witch? Perhaps, it’s he doesn’t want to assume I’m one too,’ she concludes to herself.</p><p>“Please, come inside. Mary should be here soon.”</p><p>“I can come back later,” the ginger says, not sure if she wants to be in the same room as this man when she doesn’t quite know what to disclose.</p><p>“Oh, nonsense, if you already walked here in this weather, and without even bringing a proper coat. The least I can do is offer you some coffee, or tea to warm up. Besides, my Mary will kill me if I’m not the perfect host to her friend,” he grins amicably. Zelda wants to roll her eyes at his cheerfulness. Her world is collapsing and here he is, the epitome of friendly. “Do you live close by?” He asks, moving away from the door and all but pulling her inside.</p><p>“Close enough,” she answers briefly. She’ll treat him like any other mortal, Zelda decides. “At the Spellman Mortuary.”</p><p>“Oh. So, you are a Spellman then?” She nods. “The property had always intrigued me, it looks imposing to the outsider. Mary always loved the building. However, it does give this eerie vibe. I guess it comes from being a mortuary, right? Thank God we never had to get there. Most of my patients had their funerals at the church, and my Mary hadn’t known that many people before I left. I suppose she visited it now, being your friend and all,” he shrugs. “Coffee or tea?”</p><p>“Either or,” Zelda says, keeping her face as straight as she can at the mention of the fake God.</p><p>“I’ve never seen you at church, Zelda. May I call you Zelda?” He continues as she notices the cross over the mantle that’s now inverted on the Christian’s way and scrunches up her nose, wondering what the heaven is going on here.</p><p>“That is my name,” she offers sharply before a mug of tea appears under her nose. The man smiles at her once more. The witch’s eyes the tea warily, but he dismisses it as some oddity from the woman.</p><p>“I believe you’ll be more comfortable sitting?” Adam offers, pointing towards the high-backed chairs of Mary’s living room. All Zelda can see is the way the brunette had laid sprawled in her usual chair, with her legs placed over his shoulders and his head lost between her thighs. Zelda nods but walks to the table instead.</p><p>“How come I never met you?” Adam asks, watching her with intent. Something akin to curiosity shining in his eyes. “I mean, I’ve lived all my life here until I went to med school. Then I had my practice here and left only three years ago, to work on Physicians without borders. I remember the Spellman Mortuary being almost as old as the town. Besides, we should be close enough in age, I feel I should’ve remembered you from school…”</p><p>“The mortuary is a family business that as you pointed is as old as the town. As for schooling, my parents homeschooled my siblings and me. It’s my sister, the one who usually dealt with my niece’s academic issues, and other more outgoing matters. Meeting Mary was out of chance, I suppose,” she says. Her hands itching to find a cigarette, but she perusing the room, she can’t find any of the ashtrays, or the cigarette boxes that littered the cottage since she first started showing up.</p><p>“I’m glad my Mary found someone to keep her company every once in a while,” Adam smiles, and his hand finds her softly. “Truly. I always worried something bad could happen to her, living this far away from town and being alone all the time. I won’t have to worry anymore, nor will you. I’ll be here for the foreseeable future.” He grins and takes his hand back.</p><p>“Besides Mary, what made you return to Greendale?” Zelda wonders. Eyeing sideways to the cross and feeling utterly out of place at the cottage that now seems more foreign than ever was. Especially, when she used to feel even more at home there than at the mortuary. “Don’t get me wrong. Your work sounds quite laudable, Mr. Masters. Mary aside, I don’t see what our little town could offer to someone like yourself.”</p><p>“Adam, please,” he smiles, “and it’s funny that you’d ask. I got the tickets to return on a raffle I don’t quite remember buying into. It worked out quite well since my office was suddenly closed,” the mortal explains taking a sip of his tea, and Zelda frowns. The redhead knows there are no such things as coincidences when being part of the witchy world. Adam takes this as disapproval. “Yes, I’m sure my Mary told you all about how I’ve promised I would return on time for Valentine’s day. But if these conditions weren’t met then I wouldn’t be here.”</p><p>“The Da-dear Lord works in mysterious ways. I’m glad you’ve made it back on time, I’m sure it would’ve broken our Mary’s heart if you hadn’t,” the Spellman matriarch adds. Her eyes finding the brunette’s familiar. One Mary keeps almost always hidden when Zelda is around.</p><p>Their conversation it’s stopped by the sounds of a car nearing. “That must be my Mary,” the mortal grins, and Zelda wants to burn him. The fire at the hearth burns wildly, answering her rage. “Oh, Dear Lord, whatever has happened to it?” Adam wonders, walking towards it to tame it. That’s what Lilith finds when she enters the cottage, hoping for only Zelda, but finding them both.</p><p>Zelda it’s sitting at the table, sipping a cup of tea, or so the demoness believes. While Adam’s fighting a fire that has no intentions of being controlled. Lilith smiles, amused at this, turning knowingly to the other witch. “Having issues with the fire, dear?” The demoness asks, not taking her eyes from the Spellman witch.</p><p>“I don’t know what’s wrong with it, sweetheart,” Adam answers, walking to her and pecking her cheek. The fire grows stronger, and Lilith looks at Zelda, who sighs as a response. The fire dims as if it never had been more than just the embers glowing as they are now, making the cottage look homey. “How was your day?” He continues as he helps Mary out of her coat. “Oh, sorry. When I saw you I forgot your friend Zelda came to visit you, I guess you can tell me all about your day once she leaves.” Another peck to her cheek, and this time it’s not the fire that burns, but the lights flick and the rage boils violently underneath Lilith’s skin.</p><p>“Yes, you said something about grocery shopping to take that task from my hands?” She smiles at him, and thankfully, it only takes a couple of minutes before he disappears outside.</p><p>“He’s… friendly,” Zelda states once it’s just the two of them. Lilith knows they ought to be careful because she can’t possibly send Stolas away. That would raise her familiar’s alarms scaringly easily.</p><p>“Overly so,” Lilith agrees, but she can’t care enough about the man that had left the house when Zelda is there looking at her like this. With so much love in her eyes that it pains her. “I’m sure you aren’t here to talk about him.”</p><p>“Is he the reason…” The redhead trails off, stealing a glance towards the brunette’s raven. Lilith sighs. For a second, she wishes it was just him, that Adam Masters was the cause of her inability to make love to her. It would’ve been so easy to explain that she needs to end things with the fiancé she never knew she had.  Yet, it would only add up to the pile of lies she’s building around them.  She shakes her head no.  “Oh.”</p><p>“I told you… That’s on me.” The demoness sighs. Lilith wants to ask her why had she’d come the previous night, why hadn’t she stopped her, why she didn’t take him away from her, and instead stood watching for a while before disappearing into the night.  Zelda opens her mouth to talk, but she stops herself.</p><p>“Can you make me a coffee?” The redhead asks, and Lilith understands why. Zelda must’ve noticed how she keeps her familiar locked when she’s around for long. The clattering in the kitchen will be enough to keep her familiar from listening to too much of their conversation.</p><p>“Follow me while I do?” The demoness smiles. With no mortal or bird around, Zelda wills a cigarette and offers her one, once the box materializes in her hand. They stand side-by-side smoking while they wait for the coffee machine to finish their brew. “I felt… something… yesterday. That’s why I came. I believe you’ve felt it before…” Zelda tries, the demoness hums in agreement. “Is that why you went to Faustus' office that night?”</p><p>“Yes. I wanted to see if what I deducted from it was correct,” Lilith agrees, letting out a puff of smoke. ‘It. Something.’ They could laugh at their own self-preservation that forces them to deny the feeling, calling it something neutral when wording it out. They both know it’s betrayal, the thing they felt.  “I’m sorry.” The demoness lets out.</p><p>“I can hardly blame you, love. It’s not like I haven’t put you through worse, or I will stop doing it.” Zelda sighs. “In fact...” she adds, walking to the table where the box she had been carrying laid forgotten. It ends up in Mary’s hands. Taking the last drag of her cigarette, the demoness gets rid of the filter and opens the little box that rests in her hand. Lilith closes her eyes almost instantaneously, closing the box swiftly and letting it on the countertop beside her. As if mocking the heartbreak that she’s feeling, the coffee machine spews the last drops of boiling water.</p><p>“Congratulations.” She says, not turning to watch Zelda. She can’t. “You’ll be an excellent High Priestess, even if he’s the price to pay.” Lilith feels Zelda moving from her side.</p><p>The eldest Spellman usually icy hand finds the brunette’s cheek in a learned movement that always felt so natural. Tracing sharp cheekbones until she manages to pry open the bluest of the eyes. As usual, the demoness can’t help herself and when their eyes lock, she sees so much more. “I love you,” Zelda whispers. “No matter what we do with our lives, you ought to know that I love you. I know you feel it underneath your skin, and I’ll be stupid, if I’m unable to tell this, those are the truest of the words, I can ever utter to you.”</p><p>Blues and greens are filled with tears. It’s not a goodbye, but both know there’s nothing more to them than to start saying goodbye to this something they shouldn’t have started to begin with.</p><p>“Lily,” the demoness whispers in a broken voice. “You can call me, Lily.”</p><p>Zelda gives her a teary smile, “Lily, my beautiful Lily,” she says in adoration, and Lilith feels that she’s never been under such strong praise in her many years. It helps that Zelda it’s the only one who has ever called her Lily, despite it being the first pet name her father had called her, if only once. For Adam, she was always she, the woman, her, and he had never deemed her worthy of the name their father had given her. The Fake God, he had called her Lilith since she defied him since she called him by his truest name and fleet his garden.</p><p>She surges forward and kisses Zelda squarely on her lips, bringing her as close as she can without fully melding on her. Zelda answers, in the same manner, lips parted, tongues exploring, hands tangled in soft manes. When they part, their pupils are widened, lips were swollen, and passion burns their skin and love boils underneath their skins. The demoness bites her lower lip and utters words that surprise the redhead.</p><p>“Take me somewhere nice,” grabbing the box, that’s what Zelda does.</p><p>She takes her to a cottage on Scotland’s highlands. A place she still owns after all this time. A place she had called home before. It’s not much, but’s everything they need and then some. They don’t quite need the old-fashioned furniture that makes the kitchen or the living room, but Zelda tours them through it, and as they work into make it cozier, the redhead also works into conjuring everything she needs behind the closed door of the bedroom.</p><p>Fire burns in the hearth and the place don’t smell quite enclosed, as they finally open the bedroom door. A four-poster bed takes most of the space, covered in dark silky sheets and a red comforter that looks oddly familiar to the first witch. “Did you transport that?” Lilith chuckles joyfully.</p><p>“No. I created it from memory,” Zelda confesses then, a blush covering her face at being discovered.  </p><p>“I love that you like it enough to conjure it from memory,” Lilith says, turning to the redhead and embracing her. “Where are we?” She wonders, pecking soft lips.</p><p>“Somewhere once I called home, and since has been tainted by some of my worst memories,” the redhead says, peppering her face and neck with kisses.</p><p>“Then why you brought me here?” The demoness asks, confused by it. Zelda stops what she’s doing and looks at her, love shimmering in her eyes.</p><p>“Equilibrium, Lily…” She explains caressing her cheek. As their lips find each other, and their bodies collide, the demoness understands the cryptic words. Zelda intends to create her best memories here… With her, and Lilith feels loved, powerful, and... surprising her, she feels complete.</p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0025"><h2>25. Chapter 25</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They don’t really have much time, not quite as much as Zelda would’ve loved at least. They can only steal a couple of hours, at the most, before they must get back to their not quite so peaceful lives in the most dormant of the towns. Yet, they make the most of it. They already have long committed to memory most parts of the other's anatomy, so when they finally collapse on top of the bed, there’s really just a small part left to be learned, teased, and explored for the first time.</p><p>Not wasting precious time, Zelda straddles her hips. Kissing the way down Lilith’s neck and below it, wanting nothing more than to finally cross that last barrier that’s been placed between them for far longer than the redhead had liked. Nips, licks, and kisses mark the path of fire she’s leaving burned on the brunette’s skin, and when she reaches the hem of Lily’s underwear, Zelda holds her breath.</p><p>The Spellman witch looks up, clouded greens searching darkened blues for an authorization that was never given before. Icy blues glimmer with love and lithe hips raise to accommodate the redhead’s next movement. Nimble fingers slide the last barrier from thin hips and down never-ending legs. Yet Zelda’s eyes never leave Lilith’s.</p><p>Minutes tick by before Zelda moves forward, giving her Lily time to recoil, to stop her. When nothing comes, the redhead finally moves back up to her parted mouth and tangles one hand in the dark, soft mane of her Lily. The redhead's lips reveling in the movement coming from swollen ones underneath her that search for any secrets there could remain sealed in hers. A pale hand travels the expanse of free skin, and Zelda leaves out a moan when she goes past her hips and finds it not only uncovered but undulating in want. She ends the kiss and travels south again, stopping once more in search of final approval.</p><p>There’s a moan that neither can quite tell from who came out from, as Zelda’s lips find purchase in the only part of Lilith’s anatomy left to be colonized by the redhead’s mouth. “Stop,” the demoness pants out a few seconds after the Spellman matriarch had started her feast.</p><p>On command, Zelda stills, and Lilith wants to cry for it. Never had anyone stopped on her request once passion burned them and sequestered their minds. Yet, this woman, the redhead goddess of a witch who was just starting to feast between her legs, who looks disheveled in passion and burns with a lust-filled blush, sits back on her heels and suckles her lips... Worrying that <em>she</em> had done something wrong. Lilith feels the concern and the fear of failure underneath her skin.</p><p>“Come here, Zelda. Or we both enjoy this at once, or we don’t,” the demoness says, calling her back up to her side.</p><p>“Mind you, I was enjoying myself,” the redhead says with a raised eyebrow and a huff, but still lays beside her waiting for Lilith. The demoness feels a love that she hasn’t felt for anyone before, and fears this might be the one thing to finally break her into pieces. Yet, she can’t stop herself even if she tries. The demoness caresses Zelda’s cheek reverently. In awe of this woman who loves her back so fiercely. Even if the redhead doesn’t quite know her, or the myriad of secrets that lie hidden in her mind. The brunette licks her lips in anticipation, and then she lowers them on Zelda’s moist ones. Their tempo slows down as if they had all the time in the world to savor each other to ecstasy.</p><p>Hands travel up and down their sides, finding purchase on every available piece of skin. Then, it's finally Lilith’s turn to move south and divest the redhead of the last scrap of silk that covers her. “Now, it’s all better,” the demoness says, eyes glinting with love and lust. “Hm, where was I?” she bits her lips playfully before getting back to the waiting mouth. Thighs make way between thighs, and they writhe against each other, gaining momentum as they do.</p><p>Yet, it’s not until fingers make their way inside each other’s warmth that they finally know what being complete really is. In their long lives, they have experienced many sessions of mating. Men, women, demons, and orgies had nothing on this slow lovemaking of theirs. Never had either felt so filled until then. They move into each other, lips never parting, breaths coming ragged, and sounds they never dared to utter in front, under, or on top of any other being, leave their mouths. Until they both cross over the bridge of ecstasy hand in hand. Silent moans swallowed by the other’s mouth. Eyes fluttering closed as the tremors of their orgasm flush them red, leaving them feeling disembodied and yet so alive.</p><p>Colors start to come back to the edges of their view while they still lie collapsed in a heap. Melded together in a way that’s almost impossible to tell where one ended and the other started. The room feels warm with the aftermath of their love, and yet, there’s a cold breeze sweeping from windows that had been blown open by their combined magic. On the square of dark blue and stars, they can also see the rare sight of the Aurora Borealis taking over the sky. Even when the floor is also covered by a fresh bout of snow, there’s a rich scent of flowers that wasn’t there before.</p><p>Lilith shivers as the cold air reaches her, creating a fresh wave of goosebumps in its wake. Zelda giggles at her, kissing the tip of her nose as she stands up to close the window. She can’t help the gasp when she notices the hundreds of rain lilies and Easter lilies that have blossomed in an untimely manner, somewhere during that frosty night.</p><p>“Lily, you must come to see this!” Zelda laughs happily. Curiosity is piqued on the demoness, who wraps herself quickly with the forgotten comforter and pads lazily to the window. The contrast of the mix of colorful and white flowers, the snow, and the sky shining in cyan, greens, and oranges it’s breathtaking. The demoness can’t help the laughter that bubbles from somewhere inside her. The redhead turns around surprised by this sound and looks at her Lily, and finds herself enthralled by such an innocent display of utter bliss.</p><p>Zelda wraps herself around the brunette and leaves a chaste kiss on her cheek. “I love you, Lily.” She says, placing another one on her neck. Lilith turns in her embrace, searching for her eyes.</p><p>“I…” The demoness starts, but the next words get stuck in her throat. She wants to say them to her, she does love her, more than she thought it could be possible. However, the mother of demons had let those words out once and nothing good had come from it.</p><p>Zelda sees her struggle with her words and kisses her tenderly. “I don’t need the words, Lily. I have you. I feel you. I can’t keep myself from telling them, no matter how much they scare me,” she caresses her cheek once more, reassuringly. “I promised we would go at our own pace. Today might be my time to say out loud what I’ve already confessed underneath your skin a long while ago. Yet, it’s not your moment to let them out. I understand your fears, believe me, I do, and I’m happy to wait for you, for whenever you are ready.”</p><p>Lilith is speechless and tears fall from her eyes at being under Zelda’s love. She has never been on the other end of such care. She feels undeserving, and trembles in Zelda’s arms. “Come,” the redhead says, linking their hands and pulling her towards the only room she hasn’t seen. There’s not much in it, just an old bathtub and a toilet. “I had someone add modern plumbing to this, but we will have to work out to pump and then heat the water,” Zelda states pointing her to a water pump that looks as old as the house and she hadn’t seen hiding in the corner.</p><p>“I knew there would be a trick,” Lilith chuckles, unable to stop the smile that seems to be stuck on her face. The tub fills to the brim with the coldest water they ever experienced, and with a flick of their hands, it’s just perfect to lie inside and relax. That’s what they do. “Zelda?” The demoness asks after a while of being in silence. “What’s the memory you mentioned earlier about?”</p><p>The redhead tenses up, but then she remembers that the witch that lays with her back plastered to her chest, has already felt the extent of her powers and is still here, with her. “It’s something no one knows about,” Zelda sighs. “I never mentioned it to anyone, not even Edward.”</p><p>“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” Lilith says, and although she wants to know now more than ever what happened, her statement it’s not a lie. A tender kiss grazes her shoulder.</p><p>“You’ve felt my magic… the entirety of it. Why haven’t you run to the hills like anyone else would’ve had?”  Zelda asks her softly. “Is it because yours it’s probably even greater than mine?”</p><p>“I don’t fear power, Zelda. Why would I?” She turns around and sits on the other end, facing her. “Why would you?”</p><p>“It comes from the memory that haunted this place for me,” Zelda whispers, bringing her legs to her chest and embracing them. On the other end of the tub, Lilith mimicks this posture. “What do you know about the witches who summoned hellfire?” She asks. It seems totally irrelevant to the conversation they were having.</p><p>“The same as you, I’ll suppose. Lilith, Aradia, the unknown witch, and Sabrina Spellman.” Lilith blinks then, as something hits her. “The unknown witch who bore a great resemblance to Brigit…” She looks at Zelda as if she’s seeing her for the first time. “Who has red hair, green eyes, and fair skin…’</p><p>“You once asked me if I would wield hellfire to save Greendale if I could, and even if I’m not sure I’ll do it to save Greendale... I know I did… To stop a stupid mortal quarrel. To help a mortal, I trusted in, and I thought I loved,”  Zelda sighs.</p><p>“You?” Lilith asks, more surprised for learning that the witch had loved a mortal when she all but despised them. The magical part of her confession doesn’t come unexpectedly, the demoness knows by the extent of the redhead powers that this is a truth. “Why didn’t you claim it? What happened then?” The mother of demons frowns in confusion. Because a witch of the like of Zelda, coming from a family like Zelda’s… would’ve taken every chance to rise in the ranks. To be one of the four witches who could summon Hellfire, sure as hell was not a minor detail.</p><p>“I fell in love with this place for the sky,” Zelda says, her eyes lost in the memories. “There used to be a village downhill. I rented a room there, a year or two after I left Greendale on my own. I bought this piece of land and paid some villagers to build this cottage for me. I traveled some more, and then, twenty or thirty years later, I returned. The eldests of the villagers recognized me, and I explained to them I was my daughter. They said nothing much. They mentioned I looked like their Brigit.”</p><p>“I believe it was a mix of my resemblance to their Goddess, that made them fear me, yet they still searched me for help when they needed healing. Whenever I visited the village, they were nice to me, no matter how frightened they were. For five or six of our years, I lived here in peace. There was a man, though, who dared to woo me despite the villagers’ beliefs.”</p><p>“I understand him completely,” Lilith chuckles, but after pecking her lips, she goes back to her side of the tub, asks her to go on.</p><p>“He would come searching for me and stay the night. He shared my bed and my food, and I was terribly anguished for the thought of falling in love with a mortal,” she sighs. “As per usual with the mortals, there was some sort of quandary for their land. He came to me and asked me to help them. To ask Brigit to protect them. I explained to him that even if I was a witch, as he believed, I wouldn’t be able to help them all. I was just a witch against the army that they feared.”</p><p>“Yes, it’s a pesky little trait of them, to expect us to save them from their stupidity. As if one of us could solve the matters they cause just by existing, with a single potion or incantation and for their gain,” Lilith huffed too used to that same sort of situation. “We could, but why should we?” she added then. The demoness had sided with men more than once, on Satan’s name and in trade for their souls.</p><p>“The day of the battle, he sent the children of the village to fetch me. As they stood lined to fight down at the valley, I stood at the top of the hill. Women and children kneeled in front of me, pleading for my help to save their men. I had no clue as to what to do. For the amount of power I can wield, I felt absolutely useless. Out of a sudden, I remembered my readings about Lilith and Aradia summoning fire from the pit. I knew the words by heart. So, I uttered them knowing they wouldn’t work. Why would they work for me? Yet, below, the field turned blue with hellfire flames. The enemies of the villagers became nothing but dust in the wind. The praises soon became fear. I was too high in the aftermath of wielding such a force that I failed to notice it. I failed to see they’d found a witch. I failed to see their fear.”</p><p>“There was a second round of the others nearby, for the off chance that the small army they had sent didn’t make it. I didn’t know then, not about them, nor how <em>He</em> had exchanged my life for those of his people. They came to this house whilst I was sleeping. There were five of them, and I had to defend myself. I killed them with ease. I’m sure you know how that goes…”</p><p>Unable to say anything to enthralled by Zelda’s memory, Lilith nodded. “There were more outside waiting for me. Too many, and I was tired... They took me to the same ground where so many had perished without a chance for their souls, and they trialed me as a witch. I was guilty even before they started. The stake was at ready. I was stunned. I had heard and read all about witch trials, but I was sure they were long extinct. I was so wrong, Lily. They pretended to decide what they had already concluded. As the first flames licked my skin, I cursed them all. Once was done, I teleported myself somewhere safe, and healed myself.”</p><p>“I would’ve killed them all myself!” Lilith growls. Her ire bubbling underneath Zelda’s skin, her outrage showing in the deep frown she was now carrying. “I get why you cursed them and the villager. What I don't understand is why no one knows it was you?”</p><p>“I knew that if anyone knew who I was, my own family would doom me. They would cast me aside in worse ways that I already had experienced growing up. I was worried they would forbid me from seeing my sister. So, I returned to the village under a glamor and deleted my name from their memories. I searched the land for all who could’ve known me. It wasn’t that hard, since they and their descendants carried the scent of my magic thanks to the curse.”</p><p>“Really, Zelda, they got out of it quite lightly,” Lilith huffs. It was now clear to the demoness how and why the Spellman witch was capable of understanding some of her darkest parts. Although the mother of demons had never been burned for being a witch, she had been tortured and made into a demoness for being not just one, but the first one of their kind.</p><p>“Don’t fret for this memory, Lily. It’s in the past, love. I’m alive, and they aren’t anymore. Not even one mortal memory about the village remains today. And now, this beautiful place also holds glorious memories created at your side.”</p><p>“You are such a romantic,” Lilith snorts, and touching the water that was cooling by then, she warms it up again and moves to lay once again on Zelda’s chest. “I could stay here forever…” She confesses, then sighs, “alas, we must return.”</p><p>“Sadly, we must.” Zelda agrees.</p><p>“You are getting married to Faustus, aren’t you?” the demoness asks, linking their hands over her abdomen, marveling at the way her freckled skin contrasts Zelda’s almost translucent white.</p><p>“I am,”  the redhead states. They both sigh tiredly. “You know, when Faustus presented the box to me, he said the Dark Lord revealed to him we should be married.”</p><p>“The dark lord, huh?” Lilith frowns, wondering if Lucifer worried about the extent of her relationship with the redhead, and ordered Blackwood to marry her so Zelda would stop being a distraction to Lilith. The snort coming from the Spellman matriarch was not something she expected. “What did I miss?”</p><p>“I think Faustus has delusions of grandeur and uses the Dark Lord as an excuse to cover cowardly the choices he makes that might make him look bad or weak in front of the coven,” Zelda assesses.</p><p>“Well, lack of nerve or not. I guess we all must make some sacrifices to accommodate what we intend to achieve, and yours… I hope it’s worthy. He doesn’t deserve you. You do know that, right?”</p><p>“And I don’t deserve you, yet here we are.” Zelda smiles, pecking her cheek lovingly. “We should go, we’ve been here long enough, and your Adam might start to worry that I kidnapped you.”</p><p>“He might,” Lilith sighs. Then she realizes something as they stand up and walked out of the bath. The demoness laughs wholeheartedly. “He asked me to ask you the name of your mechanic because he's clearly excellent since your car makes no sounds.”</p><p><br/>“What? I’ve teleported to your cotta…" She shakes her head then, understanding where the brunette's laughter was coming from. "Doesn’t he know you are a witch?” Zelda asks as she searched for lost underwear that was hiding from her sight.</p><p>“No. He’s a fairly recent development, I never found time  or words to tell him.” Lilith shrugs. She can't help the grin when she finds Zelda’s knickers and plays with them until the witch snatches it from her hands.</p><p>“Yet, he mentioned that you had time to go to church with him,” the redhead states, dressing back up. With a sigh, Lilith follows her lead and begins to dress too.</p><p>“I’m already an excommunicated, Zelda. What’s the worse that could’ve happened?” The demoness asks with an intrigued expression. “Don’t dwell too much on him, darling. He’s just a side dish, that can be gone in no time when I get bored with him.”</p><p>“Don’t I fall in that same line?” The redhead wonders playfully, and although her voice didn’t betray her, her feelings do.  Lilith walks towards her, bringing her close. “Zelda, no one could ever replace you. You are one of the kind for me,” she confesses in her ear. Relief floods to the brunette’s bloodstream and the redhead smiles, pecking addictive lips once more.</p><p>“I left my car under the cover of the academy. I’ll transport both of us there and I’ll drive you home. So, your fiance can hear the car approaching and stop wondering about my mechanic, who by the way... It’s just me.”</p><p>“Aren’t you a box full of surprises, dear?” Lilith says as they transport themselves to the academy parking, and she can’t help but laugh happily when the old car really doesn’t make a sound out of place.</p><p>When she finally reaches the mortuary, Zelda Spellman feels utterly blessed. Lily had allowed her to make love to her and had made love to her. The teacher had also understood her reasons for accepting Faustus' proposal, and what was even more wonderful, was that she had accepted with ease that Zelda had called fire from the pit and killed hundreds in one swift conjuring. Lily hadn’t cowered from her after that. So, when she saw Hilda, she couldn’t help the cheerful way the announcement of Faustus' proposal had come out.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>They did it!  (Please let me know what you think, I usually think I suck at this kind of chapters xD)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0026"><h2>26. Chapter 26</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Days go by and Lilith finds herself increasingly frustrated with the lack of Zelda in her life. Whenever she reaches home, there’s Adam. Adam cooking, Adam singing, Adam rubbing her feet, and then trying to show his prowess between the sheets. He’s not that bad, Lilith reckons, he simply isn’t gifted in that area (nor anyone else will be) since she just has been spoiled by Zelda.</p><p>As she plays the doting girlfriend, hoping that betrayal would lure the redhead back to her without her having to beg her to. It doesn’t. Lashing sessions; however, happen again. The demoness also fights with the need to kill Blackwood, while her desire is for Zelda to appear into her house to be healed and held well into the morning. The Spellman witch has visited her, and Lilith had healed her injuries as much as she could in a brief embrace. However, as Ms. Meeks reminds her, there’s Adam -on the phone this time- and as long as he’s there, there won’t be such luck at holding Zelda in the way she wants to.</p><p>This thing of theirs can’t be such a good idea, the demoness thinks, as she fights with herself to contain the odd mix of jealousy and the need pooling down at her core. But both Zelda and herself seem to be always busy, and the mortal seems to be always there when they aren’t. Her cards suck… again, the mother of demons decides as she takes her phone call.</p><p>It’s just her luck, though, that Adam won’t be home until late, off to somewhere to set whatever he needs to set. And yes, she wasn’t exactly paying attention to his incessant chattering. Lilith’s thoughts wandered to the conversations she had with the Spellman matriarch, under her mortal fiancé’s watch. Where Zelda had stated she would be busy with that fiance of hers, with cake tasting of all the things.</p><p>That knowledge was far more frustrating for the demoness since she would have the cottage to herself, and there wouldn’t be a chance to smuggle her favorite redhead into her bed. So, it’s on this tempestuous evening that matches her mood when she walks away from Baxter High, covered in the most powerful glamor she could muster. The demoness brings along her the tarot cards and charms people into them. She’s surprised that her stint as a tarot reader includes reading for Zelda.</p><p>Lilith knows, though, that Zelda hasn’t bought her glamor. She can see it in the way green eyes lock with hers with that ‘I’m not being played by you’ expression she got so used to see. However, the pull of her cards is strong, and the eldest Spellman feels drawn to it. “Some secrets must remain secret,” Lilith lets out by the end, and Zelda agrees.</p><p>Yet, it surprises the demoness when the redhead visits her later that night. They get out of Stolas' watchful eyes and Adam’s annoying dotingness, under the excuse of smoking. Something that the mortal dislikes happening inside the house. “Why were you pretending to be that woman?” It’s the first thing Zelda asks after kissing her Lily thoroughly against the wall.</p><p>“Well, you aren’t exactly paying attention to me, are you?” Lilith can’t help the pout. Zelda pecks her lips once more and chuckles, before getting back to the forgotten cigarette that they never smoked.</p><p>“How come I’m the one not paying attention? Lily, whenever I’m free, he’s around. I can’t exactly transport you out of here and disappear you for hours when our excuse is to have a drag. I’m even driving here to meet you.”  Zelda rolls her eyes, looking pointedly at the beaten-up car she owns for mortal purposes. Then the redhead can help but to laugh. “What?” Lilith frowns in confusion at the redhead’s sudden mirth.</p><p>“It’s that we are two witch women past adulthood by centuries, and we are hiding away as if we are harboring a teenage crush on an ill-looking mortal that would be too shameful to bed,” the eldest Spellman chuckles, leaving out a puff of smoke. In the way they look at each other, they both reckon they’ve been both in those teenage-like shoes.</p><p>“How bad did yours look?” Lilith wonders and the person who Zelda describes has the demoness shaking her head amusedly. “She was so damn cute, hiding behind her thick glasses, and mind you, she even had more hair than you do,” the redhead justified herself quickly. “And yours?” the redhead prods back, and the demoness tells her all about hers without fully disclosing that her worse looking one was actually the beast Zelda’s devoted to. They can’t help but laugh, carelessly, jovially, and they both decide that’s the most glorious sound of the many they’ve heard coming from each other.</p><p>“We certainly don’t paint the picture we sell, love,” Lilith kisses her, keeping her as close as she can. “Being two badass grownup witches with enough power to take over the world if we wanted to, despite that, hiding away for what? More power? Some sort of redemption delusion? Promises we made, and that were made to us?” the demoness musses in her ear. Tucked against her, Zelda sighs tiredly.</p><p>“If only the world was a bit more just,” the redhead breath out. With their laughs long dead, her lips search Lilith’s for another searing kiss that leaves her wanting for more. Their passion is also the one thing that gets them out of the gloomy mood that was about to settle in them. Lilith doesn’t miss the way Zelda flinches when her back is the one pressed against the wall and heals all the lashings she can without breaking their kiss. “What’s wrong?” the demoness asks, caressing the alabaster skin of Zelda’s cheek.</p><p>“It was a bit low of you to use Letty in your fortune-telling,” the redhead sighed. Her forehead placed against the brunette’s, “it hurt me more than the injuries in my back,” the eldest Spellman confessed heartedly on a whisper that tickled the mother of demons’ lips.</p><p>“I’m sorry, love, would you like another reading? So instead of what you saw, you could see what I saw. How Letty was safe at Dezmelda’s and how you and I were the ones writhing atop your desk?” The demoness smiles mischievously at this. It’s a chance, it’s a future. They can’t dwell on their future together, but their thoughts are looming on the one that brings them more apart. “Lily…” Zelda says part warning, part lust.</p><p>“I know, my sweetness, we both know,” the mother of demons said, caressing her cheek. “It’s just… I miss you, Zelda, so very much, and I can’t help to dislike missing you. I can’t help to hate being unable to hold you like this whenever I feel like.”</p><p>“I miss you too, Lily,” she whispers against swollen lips before grazing them with hers. “I wish this farce with Blackwood wasn’t a necessity. Yet, it seems he wasn’t playing when he said the Dark Lord had pointed me as his betrothed. The Anti-Pope himself is coming to Greendale to officiate the Black Wedding.”</p><p>“He is? That’s unexpected.” Lilith frowns, wondering what else Blackwood was thinking. She was already aware of his boys’ club. “Zelda… darling, are you sure you want to do this?” She asks, worrying about what could happen to her if she proceeds with this unholy wedding of hers. “Not that I won’t support whatever you decide, dear. I just want to know it is your will.”</p><p>Zelda huffed, turning her head to the side to turn on another cigarette. She let out a puff of smoke before she considered her next words. Moving her head back slightly, she searched the blue eyes filled with worry. “I don’t, Lily, but I must.”  The redhead sighed, taking another drag with closed eyes while waiting for the words to come.</p><p>“Look at me, dearest,” Lilith pleads, and waits until concerned greens are looking back at her. “I’ve said this before, and I’ll say this as many times as you need to hear them. I won’t stop you, but I must tell you I’m certain that we could find another way, Zelda. I worry about what he might do to you when it’s just the two of you,” she says, caressing her cheek. “When knowing what he already does…”</p><p>“Mary? Mary, darling, are you still out there? You’re going to catch your death on that cold!” They hear coming from the inside. The witches chuckle, “he has no idea how warm I currently am,” Lilith grins mischievously, plastering herself even further into Zelda, kissing her once more before she moves her head back. “We will be in soon!” The demoness shouts back, rolling her eyes.</p><p>There’s one more lasting kiss that will have to do to keep them going the next day or days, and they know it can only get worse. “Sometimes I hate him,” Zelda whispered against her lips. “Sometimes, I do too,” Lilith grinned. “Are you coming in? I bet he made food to last at least two decades,” she added, biting her lower lip, not wanting to part.</p><p>“I would love to, Lily,” the eldest Spellman said, caressing the brunette’s cheek. “But I don’t think that’s a good idea, right now. After having you like this, I’m not sure I can control myself over him fawning over you.” Zelda adds, grabbing icy cold hands and bringing them to her lips to kiss the inner part of her wrist. “I love you,” she whispers. “Bye, Adam!” she shouts ungracefully.</p><p>“Bye, Zelda!” Comes back in the same manner from inside. The women giggle at this, as they can get another kiss when the redhead sits behind the wheel of her car.</p><p>It’s the following night when the witches decide they don’t care about anything but the other for the time being. Whipping on Lilith’s shoulders felt beyond brutal, and she can barely hide her pain from Adam’s worried eyes. “It’s nothing, Adam,” the demoness says, but she knows it’s not. If she’s feeling the lashings with this violence, who knows what that bastard is doing to Zelda and how she must be feeling.  “I need to clear my head,” Lilith announces to a husband-to-be that looks at her as if she’s grown a second head, yet offers to walk with her. “No, I need to do this alone.” She stops him.</p><p>“If it has to do with my proposal… Mary… I didn’t mean to put pressure upon you, I just thought…” Adam tries with pleading eyes. She doesn’t find it in herself to answer.</p><p>The demoness simply crosses the threshold, closing the door behind her, as she teleports to what she hopes is Zelda’s room. The mother of demons doesn’t think that she could actually find Hilda, Sabrina, or Ambrose on the other side… No, Lilith’s blinded by the pain boiling underneath her skin, and her own need to find the redhead, comfort her and heal her. To snatch her away from this world of pain and tuck her into a cocoon where she won’t feel any hurt anymore, nevermore. She knows it won’t happen, Lilith respects Zelda too much to wrap her in a bubble or take her will away from her.</p><p>What she sees makes her own rage explode. Zelda is curled in on her bed, her body uncovered and it makes sense, there are gashes, cuts, and whole pieces of skin missing from her back. There’s a slight tremor of her shoulders that tells Lilith that she’s silently weeping. There are far many more feelings rushing through their link. It’s too damn close to home the demoness thinks. She’s been there so many times, that she can’t even remember when it started.</p><p>Feeling her in the room, the silently sobbing woman raises her hand towards where she is and the mother of demons reaches for it. “Oh, Zelda…” she whispers.</p><p>“I’m sorry, I… I’m so sorry, Lily. I’m sorry you have to endure this with me,” Zelda cries out and the demoness’ heart break, because even in her pain, it’s Lilith herself who is on the forefront of the redhead’s mind. “Shh,” the demoness says calmly. Blackwood has gone as far as marring her beautiful face, her lip is swollen and there’s a rest of blood drying on her lips. Carefully she kisses her, trying to avoid the cut. “I need to… You can’t be here, Lily. Hilda…”</p><p>“I don’t care,” the demoness states, and without further thought or discussion, she brings them to Zelda’s cottage in the middle of nowhere. Without the impending doom of Hilda arriving and finding them together when there’s no plausible explanation to give, Zelda relaxes a bit and lets Lilith nurse her. “This is going to hurt, love. There’s no way it won’t,” the mother of demons’ whispers tenderly. The redhead nods in understanding. Then warm hands are plastered against a destroyed back. Zelda groans when she tries to bit her lip and bites into the previously done wound.</p><p>Once the initial pain subsides, there’s warmth and peace as chunks of skin seem to appear out of the blue, and healing powers course through them both. “Why are you so good at this?” Zelda wonders, because healing it’s not something all the witches can master with that ease. The redhead knows it had taken a while for her to learn to do it if only because she was used to the violence of her father and healing herself was the only way to protect Hilda from knowing that about him, and it did come in handy with some of her lovers.</p><p>“Let’s say I’ve got plenty of experience,” Lilith discloses. Zelda wants to ask more, yet her eyes flutter closed, while she fights to keep herself awake. “Sleep, love. It will help,” the demoness says affectionately, moving threads of hair that had plastered themselves sweaty on her face. “But you are here now, and I miss you so much, Lily...” the redhead whined. “How can I sleep now, when I can barely see you anymore? When I can barely hold you...”</p><p>“I’ll be here when you wake up,” she says, accommodating them so she can work on the Spellman’s witch back, and hold her as close as she can. “I’m going to fix you, and then, when you wake up in the middle of the night, as you always do, you can hold me instead. I’ll make sure to set anything we need to have us both back in Greendale in time for tomorrow morning. Okay, dearest?” Zelda nods.</p><p>“I’m so sorry, Lily. Please, believe me.” The redhead whispers and the demoness feels the shame and the regret her love feels.</p><p>“I do, Zelda. I do and I understand.” Lilith says because she does. She forgives and understands, maybe too well, what’s going on in her love’s head. She presumes Zelda finds the truth in her words or in the feelings she can’t stop from getting to her, because the beaten up Spellman matriarch nods against her chest, and relaxes into her touch.</p><p>By the time the mother of demons is finished with Zelda’s back, she too feels exhausted. Still, she promised her they would get back in time to face their mornings. The demoness settles whatever they need to be awoken, taking into consideration that she doesn’t really know in which time zone they currently are. With alarms out of the way, she accommodates better into the bed, holding her Zelda comfortably in her arms as what Lilith thinks the redhead is, the most precious person she’s ever held. “I love you, Zelda,” she whispers confidently, knowing the witch is asleep before she too is claimed by the dark.</p><p>No one is the wiser about what had transpired that night. Faustus just assumes Zelda is as good at healing herself as she is at every other thing she’s ever set her mind to. Father Blackwood notices, though, how even someone as strong-minded as Zelda Spellman is breaking under his touch. He prides in this. She, who thought she could bolster him, it’s being slowly brought to her knees, right where she belongs.</p><p>Lilith simply said, “I stayed over at the mortuary. I needed time,” when Zelda drops her home the following morning so she could get ready to face Baxter High. It’s later that night when she’s explaining to Adam why she hates marriages, that she understands she must try to stop Zelda from getting married herself, no matter how much she supports and understands her reasons.</p><p>The demoness knows it might be too damn late, and it can have other repercussions on her. It’s the night before her wedding. Stolas had announced to her that the antipope had arrived and had been killed inside the Academy walls. Just before the Dark Lord had visited Lilith and ordered to get rid of her mortal fiancé. Right around when she had felt Zelda’s panic bubbling underneath her skin in ways she had never felt before.</p><p>“You belong to me and only to me,” she can still hear the Dark Lord's words. Still, she needed to find Zelda, and the Dark Lord's menace be damned, she did.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0027"><h2>27. Chapter 27</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Okay... I have no clue as to where half of this comes from... yet, there's a motive for it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>As the chaos of that night settles, Lilith transports herself inside the Academy walls. She’s sure that Zelda would’ve been given a room in there and as things are, the demoness is certain the eldest Spellman would’ve found a way to be left alone to think on her next steps.</p><p>She stops a child that’s rushing around still scared, asking her where she can find the bride-to-be. Getting directions to a guests’ room, and sure, Lilith finds her alone, pacing barefooted over carpeted floors.</p><p>The demoness decides that trying to convince this shaken woman to come with her will be futile. Instead, she cuts the space separating her from the redhead, and kisses her, teleporting them both to the cottage that now has become their own private sanctuary in the few hours spent there. “What in heaven’s name are you doing, Lily?” Zelda asks, once they break for air, and looks around to find herself away from the Academy walls.</p><p>“I need to talk to you. I can’t do that at my home with Adam lurking around. We certainly couldn’t be having this talk in yours, and I don’t trust the academy walls. I’m sure you don’t either.”</p><p>“Then talk,” Zelda sighs. Lilith had felt the sheer panic earlier that night. She still feels some worry and fear, but she’s sure the latter has more to do with her nephew’s situation.</p><p>“What happened?” Lilith asks. Zelda raises her eyebrow, suspecting the brunette already knew what had transpired that night. “I mean, the part I care about… You know, not the anti-pope death or the fact that Blackwood points your nephew as the guilty party?” The demoness explains.</p><p>The redhead raises her eyes wondering how on heavens she already knows the last part. “I had to make myself scarce to find you. Children speak loudly when they are scared,” she waves in dismissal. “So, will you tell me what on Heaven’s made you so afraid? I felt positively petrified.”</p><p>It’s easy for her to see some of that fear still lurking inside the Spellman matriarch when she blanches beyond her usual shade. “The Dark Lord appeared in my room to make his claim,” Zelda states.</p><p>“Son of a bitch,” the demoness hisses. This goes unnoticed by the redhead who can’t stop herself now that she started.</p><p>“I was certain he wouldn’t come for me. He never answered my prayers. He wasn’t there when I signed my name into his book. He surely wasn’t there the two times I was almost burned to death for being a witch,” Zelda paces. Then she stops dead in her tracks.</p><p>“I was saved from being… from being his… by the Anti-Pope’s death. How can I be so relieved to hear someone I revered died? What makes me feel worse is they are blaming Ambrose for it. I had to leave Hilda and Sabrina back home. They will have to help him keep himself safe… It’s a damn mess, Lily!” Zelda says, plopping herself on the bed. “You must take me back before Faustus notices I’ve disappeared too. Before he decides he wants to cancel the wedding.”</p><p>“Your nephew is being accused of killing the Anti-Pope. Right after your niece tried to present Edward’s manifesto to him. Your sister killed another witch who was pissed off at this wedding. The Dark Lord almost raped you. Zelda… Aren’t those enough bad omens? Why are you still wanting to go through with this nonsense? We should just uproot your family and run as far away from Faustus Blackwood as we can.”</p><p>“We could never outrun him, Lily,” Zelda says sadly. Touched that the brunette had included herself in this escape of hers. “Even if we did, how could we ever outrun the Dark Lord?”</p><p>Lilith’s stomach clenches at that last question. “We don’t, Zelda. You can still cancel the wedding. Who cares about the Church of Night anymore? Somehow we’ll prove your nephew is innocent.”</p><p>“You don’t understand, Lily… I must…” Zelda answers, eyes filled with pained tears that won’t be allowed to escape.  Lilith wants to say she doesn’t understand, but she does. She’s still serving the Dark Lord and wants the promised crown. Yet, situations are so different. Whereas she can understand power, and wanting to keep her family safe… She can’t quite understand Zelda’s reasoning. Zelda has power, Lilith thinks she should just take it all.</p><p>The demoness plays the last card in her hands, the one she knows will hurt because knowing the redhead as she did, Lilith also knows the answer to it. “Even when…” she waves between them, standing in between Zelda’s legs. “It might break us?”</p><p>“More so, Lily,” the redhead says.  Caressing Lilith’s cheek with her thumbs and cleaning away the tears that fall from blue eyes. Zelda firmly believes that having Faustus Blackwood on her bed will allow her to protect everyone she loves, her Lily included.</p><p>“He lashes you at any chance when there’s not enough penance to cover what he does to you. He wants to kill your nephew. He hates your niece’s guts. He despised your brother, and he’s beyond jealous of you. You know all of this. You have the power to overthrow him. Why are you so willing to go through with this marriage? Why are you so willing to walk the path to your own doom?”</p><p>Lilith looks at her, eyes filled with worry, and she wonders if her title of ‘Dawn of Doom’ was conceived with this moment in mind. With this redhead about to walk the path to damnation beside a man who has sold his soul for more power than he had. Even so, Faustus can’t quite wield half of what Zelda owns in her pinky.  “I must, Lily. It’s the only way I can control him, mold him to my needs. Help them.”</p><p>“Faustus’s going to get you killed!” The demoness shouts in frustration, and it’s her turn to pace, to diffuse some of the raging energy she feels growing with every minute that ticks by. Lilith knows the excuses; she’s been saying them all to herself since almost the beginning of time.</p><p>The demoness thinks it’s her own story being played all over again over some nonsensically opposite. While hers was about not wanting to marry a man they made for her because he wanted to control her. Zelda’s is about marrying a man that wasn’t made for her to try to control him. “No, Faustus’s harmless, really. Besides, it’s the only way to retrieve the luster to the Spellman name,” the redhead muttered the last, unable to raise her eyes to meet surprised blues.</p><p>“The luster? Why do you care about the luster? Heavens, Zelda! You can summon hellfire! You are by far the strongest witch I know. Why do you care so much about what others think about something so stupid as your family name? Why are you so hell-bent on restoring something that has no meaning to anyone else?” The demoness asks, outraged by this silliness. She thinks that if she can convince Zelda that this luster, she speaks of so fondly, is nothing but a mirage, then there’s hope to stop her from making this mistake.</p><p>“Because!” Zelda shouts back, standing up if only to stop the brunette’s rant.</p><p>“Because, what? I’m not a two-year-old at who you can throw a because and would take it as a valid explanation, Zelda. No. I want a real motive, why ‘the Spellman’s luster’ is so damn important to you? When it isn’t important to Hilda, or Ambrose, or Sabrina? They are the ones causing chaos! Let them grow up and clean their own messes. Why it must be you?! You are not their maiden, for hell-sakes! Why you?!”</p><p>The rage underneath their skin’s bubbles savagely, menacing to burn entire cities if it’s freed. They are standing almost nose to nose, irked beyond recognition. “Because I’m not a Spellman!” Zelda shouts out of the sheer pressure of their ire. Covering her mouth and gasping for air when her truth comes out. A lonely tear runs down her face. “There, I’ve said it. Are you happy now?” She whispers, broken.</p><p>“Wh-what do you mean you are not a Spellman?” Lilith frowns, that was not something she saw coming.</p><p>“Disappointing, right?” Zelda sighs as she moves to sit against the headboard.</p><p>“No, just... surprising,” the demoness says, and the redhead can feel she’s not lying.</p><p>“Sit, Lily, it will take a while,” she whispers, giving her a self-deprecating half-smile. “Edward’s family was getting ready to travel. He had outgrown their little coven. The mortal year was 1599. Edward Spellman already had completed fifty-nine turns of the wheel, and they raised him to crave for far more than their little village could give them. In the darkest hour of the coldest day of that year, the dogs howled, near their cottage. There’s was a knock on their door, they thought it must be a Brother or Sister since they warded their house for mortals. Once they opened the door, they found me, at their doorstep. Secured in a basket, heavy dark fabric keeping me warm. Someone dropped me at their door. I wasn’t good enough to be my own parents’ child.” Zelda confesses in a whisper, cleaning a tear from her cheek.</p><p>“Oh, my sweetness,” Lilith mutters, hugging her tightly. Their rage is fully smothered. Self-deprecation and anguish take over them swiftly.</p><p>The demoness wants to tell her that at least she was given away to a family. Whereas her own father had cast her away. Cursed her to a life of birthing demons at will only so they will be doomed to die in hundreds a day, even before she could name them sometimes. Yet, she couldn’t share that without giving herself away. “The Spellman’s raised you as their own. They gave you their name, isn’t that good?”</p><p>“It would’ve been, I suppose, if there wasn’t more to it. A child was not in their plans, and they didn’t even know if I was mortal or witch. Edward took me inside, and when he picked me up, they noticed the Strophalos secured on a necklace.”</p><p>“Hekate’s wheel. So, whoever dropped you was someone who knew about magic.” Lilith states.</p><p>“Precisely, and moreover, someone who dared to mock them,” Zelda adds. Confusion is painted all over the brunette’s expression. “There was a note. It claimed I was Hekate’s child, the Spellman’s were named my guardians, and I was to be raised as their own. It also stated my witch name was Phiona, and I took it. Had not Edward insisted they should do as it said, I wouldn’t be here. He named me his little sister, his Zelda,” she says with a teary smile. “They couldn’t convince him otherwise. Thus, it was deemed safer if they never talked about my origins. When my magic flowed uncontrolled, they… They got scared. It only got worse when Hilda was born. She was so cute; she was everything they ever wanted. Everything I was not.”</p><p>“Oh, Zelda…” Lilith whispers, bringing her closer again. Feeling her pain and understanding why they connected so perfectly. So completely. It’s encased in her arms that Zelda finds the strength to finish her story.</p><p>“All I knew growing up was that I was never worthy under my parents’ eyes. I was never enough. I was no man, nor was I the cute child they cherished. All I wanted was to hate Hilda, but the more I knew her, the more I loved her. She was so good to me, the kindest of them. Perhaps because she never knew differently. I am her sister and there’s that. Growing up, I prayed several times a day for the Dark Lord to take my powers away, to make me a mortal, to claim my soul to the underworld, and he never did.”</p><p>“I’m glad he didn’t, Zelda. Or I wouldn’t meet you,” Lilith tries to cheer her up, and her attempt brings a smile to the redhead’s lips. She kisses her, it’s salty with all the tears that are falling from them both. Their shared bond making the storytelling even more painful to hear than it would’ve if Lilith didn’t feel the redhead’s feelings too.</p><p>“I knew what a disappointment I was even before I turned sixteen. It was obvious I was going to break the Spellman tradition of being baptized on a blood moon. The morning of my Dark Baptism, my so-called parents’, took me into the woods and confessed they adopted me. Since I wasn’t their child, they said they would understand if I didn’t want to sign my name away. It would be a relief for them since I wouldn’t be bringing down the Spellman tradition. However, they warned me, if I didn’t sign my name, they would deny me as a Spellman.”</p><p>“The nerve of those people! It’s an impossible choice!” Lilith hisses. “You were nothing but a child! You knew nothing more than to be their child.”</p><p>“Precisely, so, I went to the woods and signed the book. Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn’t have. Things happened that night… That no one could ever explain… The moment my blood touched the book, the new moon became a blood moon, the winds raised, the hounds howled, the clear was covered in lush plants until there wasn’t a dark hair in my head anymore, and I became the ginger you know. I was ecstatic, I thought the Spellman’s would finally be proud of me. Yet, when I turned around, everyone was terrified. The next morning, the High Priest requested them to leave. We had to leave because they were afraid of me.”</p><p>“Oh, child. I’m sorry, dear. I’m so sorry,” Lilith whispers, tightening the embrace as much as she can. Trying to meld herself into the other woman. She waits until Zelda stops crying her heart out before she asks. “Is this the first time you tell this?” The redhead nods and a new wave of love pours into Lilith. “Thank you for trusting me with it, my sweet Zelda.”</p><p>“I’m not sure why I did. I just know you won’t harm me because I’m not who I pretend to be.”</p><p>“Born of them or not, you are Zelda Phiona Spellman. It’s only you or I who can tell otherwise, and neither will. Not when I understand your pain, dear, perhaps better than you’ll ever know. However, with this new insight, I understand even less why you worry about the luster of the Spellman.”</p><p>Zelda sits up, clearing her tears away. “I became their matriarch, Lily, the moment Edward died. I can’t step away from it now, not without outing me and everything I’ve portrayed. While I remain, I’m failing my role utterly. I’m disappointing them all over again. I couldn’t protect Edward. I can barely help Sabrina. I’m not sure I can free Ambrose. At least, Hilda isn’t excommunicated anymore. I’m sure that with his ear at my reach, I’ll be able to find a way to get a lighter sentence for Ambrose, at least to keep him alive. To keep all of them alive,” she takes a deep breath.</p><p>“If I knew how... Lily…” She says searching blue eyes and caressing Lilith’s cheek. “I would’ve spared you from feeling what I feel. So, you wouldn’t have to come along to his brutal ways on me. So, you wouldn’t feel my stupid emotions that run so deeply. I’m also failing you, love. I don’t know how to detach us, and I’m terribly sorry about it.”</p><p>“You are not failing me, Zelda,” Lilith whispers, cleaning tears that keep falling freely from Zelda’s torn face. “Do you think I’m failing you?”</p><p>“Never!”</p><p>“Yet, I’m also unable to detach us, love. Perhaps, it’s just how things are supposed to be. Perhaps I must be there to share your burden even from afar,” the demoness says as an explanation.</p><p>“Oh, Lily! I don’t care what he does or doesn’t do with me. If I can protect them even in the feeblest of the ways. Even if that means whoring my body into his every whim and be left nothing more than the bare pieces of my soul to collect. If I can protect them, it'll be worth it. It would be worthier if I could spare you from it all.”</p><p>“Don’t fret, love. We’ll find a way to hold into each other and come out of this stronger. You do what you ought to do, and I’ll do what I ought to do, as we both agreed before. One day, he’ll fall, and you will ascend.”</p><p>“I’m not sure that is the Dark Lord’s will. I could’ve been the High Priestess when Edward died, and yet, there’s Faustus.”</p><p>“If for once Blackwood isn’t covering his weakness by using the Dark Lord’s name. Doesn’t it mean our Lord has something special planned for you?” Lilith asks. She knows her words might be a lie. That perhaps what Satan is planning is to get rid of Zelda to make his path easier. To bring the apocalypse without this strong witch there to stop it.  “As much as I don’t want to get you back, tell me when you feel ready to return, Zelda."</p><p>“Just… hold me for a while?”</p><p>“Always. Whenever you need me, I’ll do my best to be there. I promise, love.”</p><p>“Don’t make promises you don’t intend to keep,” Zelda whispers against her neck, a reminiscence of the words Lilith had said to her before.</p><p>“No, dearest. That’s why I said I’ll do my best. I can’t promise I’ll always manage. Some things can escape our control.”</p><p>“As long as you try, love.”</p><p>“That’s all I can promise you, Zelda Phiona Spellman.”</p><p>“I’ll take it, darling Lily,” the redhead says before kissing her, sealing the deal. When they finally break for air, Zelda takes a deep breath. “Take me back, love. I’m ready.”</p>
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<a name="section0028"><h2>28. Chapter 28</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Despite their conversation, and the reassuring comfort of each other’s company, albeit for such a short time, their fears remain, bubbling underneath their skin and they both find themselves awake early after a restless night. Zelda finds herself pacing back and forth inside the room they gave her for this occasion. Thinking back to the conversation she held with her Lily.</p><p>Truly, she could break into Ambrose’s witch’s cell and get him out in a blink of an eye. Her nephew was a kind and free spirit that had already survived too many years in the almost isolation of the Spellman Mortuary to be kept tucked inside again. However, life on the run didn’t sound as appealing either. As she already said to the brunette, there’s no outrunning the Dark Lord. If he wanted blood atonement, he sure would find her nephew and get his will fulfilled.</p><p>Hilda visits her, and she sees her sister’s growing need of disclosing what has transpired since Faustus and his boys all but escorted her out of the mortuary. Furthermore, she knows a plea to believe in Ambrose’s innocence -As if she didn’t- would follow it. Yes, her nephew could’ve tried to blow up the Vatican, but decades had passed, and during their many shared nights at the library, he had explained to Zelda his surprisingly valid reasons.</p><p>Yet, knowing him as she does, the Spellman matriarch is aware that there’s no reason for killing the Anti-Pope, lest when she knew Ambrose was more anxious as to fulfilling Luke’s position as his caretaker as he had confessed it to her. <em>“A true testament of my change, Auntie, a chance to show them they can free me,”</em> he had grinned while they conferred on the library, still trying to figure out what was wrong with her and Lily.  “<em>Yes, Ambrose, and you ought to show him your best. As far as I know, the father of fathers had a special bond with Edward. You can plea to his good grace and he might revoke your sentence if you behave. Now, have you found anything at all that could explain my bond to Lily, and how to revoke it?”</em></p><p><em>“Lily, huh?” </em>He had grinned, wriggling his eyebrows at her, and she had chuckled at this.<em> “So, you are at witches’ names already? Does she call you Phiona, too?” </em>He prodded with a smile, and she rolled her eyes at him.<em> “We’ve been sharing this bond for months, Ambrose. It’s hardly inappropriate that I call her whatever she tells me to call her, right? And no, Zelda works just fine,” </em>she answered, making him grin widely. “<em>I’m happy for you, Auntie Zee. I trust it is this bond and not Father Blackwood, the one that puts that glint of true happiness in your eyes.” </em> Zelda had kept quiet, Ambrose was always the silent observer, and they were always closer than anyone thought they could be. Still, she chose not to disclose the extent of her relationship with Mary ‘Lily’ Wardwell, not even to him.</p><p>“What do you think, Zelds?” Hilda asks, bringing her back from her memories. Zelda frowns, she had been so focused on her own reminiscence that she hadn’t heard a word of what Hilda was saying. “I was just saying hmm, Father Blackwood acted in haste last night. He could’ve given the boys a chance to explain themselves before nailing them to death, don’t you think? Sharp blades, those can be,” she adds, and Zelda fights a flinch out of her expression. She’s perfectly acquainted with how sharpened Faustus’s keeps his nails.</p><p>Although Zelda agrees with her sister on the alacrity of his punishment to his boys, she must remain neutral. If she has to gain Faustus' ear, the least she can do is doubt his actions the morning of their union. “Can we not talk about it?” She asks abruptly, and Hilda frowns in confusion about it. “What happened last night is done, Hilda. Now, we just have to hope that Ambrose will turn himself in and for Father Blackwood’s mercy to provide our nephew with a fair trial where Ambrose can explain himself.”</p><p>“Turn himself in? Explain himself?” Hilda stutters her words. “Zelds? It’s Ambrose…”</p><p>“Hilda. I know my own nephew. What we can’t deny are facts, though. Ambrose had the knife. He was covered in blood. He was inside the room and he wasn’t exactly trying to protect the Father of Fathers. What else can we infer from that view? That an unruly demon controlled him?”</p><p>“Ye-yes! Why not?!”</p><p>“Please, sister, spare me the idiocy of an unknown puppeteer act. I’m quite certain that if Ambrose is innocent, he will able to find some evidence of it. Now, I’m already stressed enough about the wedding and funeral. I can’t deal with our family’s need to ruin every effort I make to bring the Spellman’s name back to its old shine. All I want is for this day to be over so I can start my future as Zelda Spellman-Blackwood.” She says with a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes.  Sighing, Hilda helps her with the rituals they must go through to prepare for the wedding. The blonde isn’t privy to the nerve-racking feelings her sister keeps locked inside or how Zelda’s mind was running a thousand miles per minute to figure a way to fix this new event. As Sabrina once’s said, the Spellmans were an endangered species.</p><p>Back at the cottage, Lilith also could not shut an eye. Granted, as a demon, she doesn’t quite need it either. Yet, she enjoys sleep as the witch she once was. Her sleepless status comes from a mix of Zelda’s worries and her own jittery mind. She eyes the mortal sleeping in her bed and thought about the Dark Lord’s words.</p><p>Even if she felt a bit sorry that this seemingly kind mortal had been brought into the chaos of her life in an untimely manner. The mother of demons feels it’s her fault he’s under an impending doom, even if she planned to get rid of him at some point or another.</p><p>“You belong to me and only to me,” she mumbles, playing with the neck of her clothes. Yes, she feels a bit sorry about Adam Masters, but her worry falls straight into the redhead that’s getting married that very same night. As Lucifer’s handmaiden, she wonders if this menace of her master comes with a veiled threat towards Zelda Spellman, too. She can’t help but dwell on what would’ve happened to the redhead, hadn’t someone killed the Anti-Pope when they did it? What would’ve Lucifer have done to her? Would he feel Lilith’s own magic thrumming below the skin of the Spellman witch? Mixing with Zelda’s own brand of power?</p><p>No, she vowed to herself not to allow her bond to Zelda to be the doom of the redhead. Taking one page of Sabrina’s usual behavior, after a tedious day at the school, she found a ring that would fit Adam Masters. That night under the eyes of Stolas, she made a ritual to enchant the ring to hide her fiance. Surely, the mother of demons would notice how profound Satan’s grasps on her was if even when magically hidden, something ill came to the mortal.</p><p>That night, as per the bride-to-be requested from her, Lilith doesn’t show up at the desecrated church. Zelda had pleaded her not to when she dropped her back at the academy the previous night. “Please, Lily, whatever it happens, whatever you feel I’m feeling… Do not show up tonight, I won’t be able to do it if I feel you there.”  The redhead had said, then Zelda had kissed her, desperately, “promise me, Lily,” she had added with pleading greens fixated on her eyes and soft thumbs caressing her cheeks. Unable to do much more, Lilith had agreed with her before she got herself back out of the hidden veil of the Academy.</p><p>The demoness desperately wanted to be there. To see her Zelda on this day, looking as radiant as only a bride could. The nervousness pouring out of the redhead towards her was overwhelming, and then there was worry and disappointment brought to the mix.  After a while there was finally some pride around the time Adam arrived at her home.  Then Lilith was left to deal with outrage and shame.</p><p>‘What in Heaven is going on with you, love?’ Lilith thinks as Adam takes her to their room. He tries to make love to her and has her half undressed before the mother of demons slips out from the bed. “I’m sorry, Adam… I’m just too tired. I guess I became overly excited, with the idea of setting the date…” The demoness throws over her shoulder, fitting her robe snuggly against her. Surprising her, the man rolls to his side, a cheerful smile on his face.</p><p>“It doesn’t matter, Mary. It surprised me we’ve been together as many times since I’ve returned. You were never this forthcoming before,” he says, looking at her. She shakes her head, feeling sorry for the real Mary Wardwell. Lilith had overhauled her life, and no one seemed to know she wasn’t herself anymore. Not even her fiancé. Or what was worse, if they did, they didn’t care at all.</p><p>No matter how much the demoness had tried, her mind didn’t stop for a second from over-analyzing the feelings she felt, dissecting each one of them until it seemed the redhead had finally given out to sleep and morning was already upon her.</p><p>It wouldn’t be until later that Lilith would overhear the academy students exchange comments about the catastrophic wedding they all thought would be postponed. How, in the end, Father Blackwood had married his bride in his office after being attacked by her nephew. There were giggles too, coming from the teachers, about how finally someone had put a Spellman in place, by making Zelda walk behind him instead of beside him when they left.</p><p>Rage boiled inside her as her fears started to settle at the pit of her stomach. Lilith had always known Faustus Blackwood was a misogynist, proof of that was the way he had treated her every time she had appeared in front of him. Not caring about how she was closer to the Dark Lord than he could ever be, Blackwood had always treated her like a second-class demon, for being a female. Like Satan’s whore instead of his right hand.</p><p>Worry follows as Lilith feels the change in their bond not even twelve hours after the newlyweds left, and she doesn’t quite understand where it comes from. Lilith knows the ‘Blackwoods’ had teleported themselves to another academy in Rome. To take the Anti-Pope’s remains to the necropolis underneath the Vatican. However, it’s not distance what had changed it, no... this has happened a long while after they got there, and the demoness fears what this could mean.</p><p>It takes the demoness days before she has an inkling of what it could be. It’s not all her fault, though, her library is limited and she can hardly pop in hell to figure out or find Ambrose Spellman in search of what he learned about her link with Zelda. Nor she can pop into the mortuary to ask Hilda or Sabrina what they know about the redhead Spellman when there are no explanations about her sudden interest to give them. Now, what she feels… Lilith sighs. She feels this happy energy that doesn’t agree with all the feelings she had felt before or those she continues to feel even underneath the vibrating happiness that doesn’t quite feel real.</p><p>She doesn’t feel the whipping anymore, however, Lilith feels the anguish, and the heart tearing pain that comes across their bond. The redhead’s agony feels different, stronger, yet it doesn’t feel embodied. As if the connection was there, yet severed. As if Zelda isn’t fully in her own flesh anymore, but she’s still alive.</p><p>“Maybe she finally severed part of our link,” she considers. Whatever it happened, it doesn’t feel right. So, days later, when she can’t take her doubts anymore, she pushes Adam out of the door to complete some menial task and he’s happy to oblige.</p><p>With the cottage to herself, the demoness searches for the can where she keeps all the filters of the smoked cigarettes she’s shared with Zelda. Be there anyone else, it would be a bit creepy to keep such mementos; however, having been in touch with their skin, they must dispose of them in the same way they do hair and nails to prevent anyone to control or find them using something as unique as their DNA.  Sighing, she searches for one that has the right shade of lipstick and uses it to find her.</p><p>“Unholy hell,” she lets out when she travels to the other end of the world and finds a pliant Zelda who doesn’t recognize her. The dullness in her eyes, it’s nothing compared to the usual feisty glimmer that shines in her greens. There’s barely intact flesh in her back, yet there’s a pleasant smile on the redhead’s face as if the wounds she’s sporting are not existing. “My sweet, Zelda…” She tries.</p><p>The redhead blinks and stands up, instantaneously she’s covered in a flowery dress that doesn’t fit the usually stern look of the woman Lilith loves. There’s also no recognition on her face or eyes at all, and that pains the demoness more than she’s willing to admit if even to herself. “Oh, isn’t this music box marvelous? It was a wedding present from his Unholy Eminence,” the eldest Spellman says with a voice so soft that the mother of demons’ eyes widens in surprise at it.</p><p>The demoness walks to Zelda, embracing her as she reaches her. Knowing the wounds underneath the silk of the Spellman matriarch’s dress, she presses her hands tightly against the redhead’s back. Frowning when she gets no reaction from it. At least, not from the woman standing in front of her. Yet, Lilith feels the disembodied anguish fluttering underneath her skin. She frees her and the pain subsides. Looking around, the brunette locates with a simple spell everything that contains Zelda’s DNA. The music box she had mentioned earlier is one of those objects. A soft song comes from it, and with little reason for it, the Spellman witch twirls as if following the little dancer standing on top of it.</p><p>“Bastard,” Lilith mutters, searching the box and finding the bounding object. A picture of a young Zelda hiding inside it. She takes a second or two to figure out the potential outcomes of what she can do. Looking at the image in her hand, and at the twirling witch, the demoness decides to lift, albeit temporarily, the veil of the curse the redhead is under. Only to attempt convincing Zelda to run away. A task the brunette reckons as almost impossible. If she doesn’t manage, she can undo her change and Faustus wouldn’t be the wiser as to how she temporarily postponed his spell.</p><p>The moment she waves her hand to pause the spell, Lilith feels her fully and has to lean on the vanity where the box was in to deal with the torment of Zelda’s embodied feelings. A cry comes out from the Spellman matriarch. It is nothing quite like Lilith’s has heard coming from her before. It reminds her of her own pained screeches that could kill if directed to someone “What are you doing here, Lily? You shouldn’t be here… You should…” She pants, her face scrunches up in agony.</p><p>“Zelda, please… Love… You have to go, run away, and never return to Greendale.” Lilith pleads.</p><p>“I can’t, Lily. They are going to kill Ambrose. He… Faustus is absolutely insane, love. I fear now more than ever what it would come to the Spellmans’. What he could do to you if he finds out about us.”  She says, caressing the brunette’s cheek softly. “I know this will kill you, darling, but you must place me under his spell again. Otherwise, I won’t be able to pretend for long, and I’ll last even less.”</p><p>“But, love… I can feel your suffering and I can feel this fake happiness… It kills me, Zelda, more than keeping you here. Knowing why those feelings are there... I…” The redhead stops her with an Earth-shattering kiss, bringing her so close. It stops all their thoughts until the demoness presses her hands against an injured back and Zelda cries out in pain. “Oh, heavens… I’m sorry…”</p><p>“You need to go, Lily. He might return soon. Please, search for me when we get back. By then, I hope to have greater insight as to what his plans are for us. When I know, we can think of a way to overthrow him. As I should’ve done before, I took his stupid last name.” She pecks Lilith’s lips once more. “I love you, Lily. I’m glad you at least are feeling the happiness too, no matter how fake it is. You deserve to be happy too, and whereas I’m all sorts of wrong for you... Adam is a great man.”  Reaching for the teacher’s hands, Zelda places a loving kiss on the inner side of her wrists as it had been her trademark almost since the beginning.</p><p>Tears leave them both before Lilith raises her hand, and the veil is down once again. The demoness cries when her love’s eyes cloud, the cheerful smile plasters itself on formerly bright red lips and a feeling of content invades her bloodstream above all the other painful emotions that Zelda feels but can’t show.</p><p>Before getting herself back to Greendale, the demoness adds one more vow to her list... She’s going to kill Faustus Blackwood in the most painful way she knows, and no matter how ruthless she ends up being, she’s going to enjoy every second of it.</p>
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<a name="section0029"><h2>29. Chapter 29</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s Zelda’s bubbly happiness underneath her skin that makes Lilith take Adam’s offering to take a day off that morning. Yet, not even in her cheeriness, the demoness forgets about her redhead, or about her own plans -or the Dark Lord ones, for that matter-. It seems that despite it all, she still harbors some impeccable timing, since instead of calling in sick, she went to Baxter High, only to find Sabrina in there.</p><p>There’s a part of the mother of demons that wants to shake the teenager to see if that makes two of her neurons connect and somehow make the teen understand the mess she’s obliviously causing. However, her job as Satan’s handmaiden is to keep her unknowingly walking down the path to fulfilling her prophecy.</p><p>Lilith is worried, too. It’s been only four or five centuries of equilibrium of powers that came after millennia of unbalanced forces. If she was honest, she was getting used to the comfort of the balance. The same one she’d thrown off when starting the Book of the Beast.</p><p>Said balance is now being shattered by the Spellman teen whenever she accesses her magic. Be that as may, plans are established, and things need to be set in motion. Thus, the demoness pushes the teen to see if there’s a way to make Sabrina fulfill more of the perversions she needs to complete. Pointing her to restoring the sight of a blind, is a piece of cake once the strong-headed girl barrels into her office as Principal Wardwell leaves for her personal day.</p><p>The mother of demons wants to feel sorry for Zelda’s niece. It is much what she’s taking over her young shoulders. However, she can’t think of anyone who isn’t at this point. The girl’s mortal chums -that Sabrina herself had brought along- included. Instead of worrying, Lilith takes her day off.</p><p>That’s how the demoness finds herself walking with her arm linked with Adam’s, in high heels, in some part of the neighboring town she hasn’t seen before. The entire time Lilith feels Stolas’s watchful eyes studying them.</p><p>The demoness is beyond surprised when the mortal tells her he wants to take her to Tibet, so much that she laughs at him. Adam continues, though, offering her to see the world as she always wanted to, but never dared before out of her love to Greendale. The mother of demons must hold her laugh then.</p><p>Lilith had seen the world so many times and in so many ways, all past beyond the mortal’s fantasies. The good, the bad she had seen them both. Yet, in the ugliest parts of it, the demoness had lived, commanded, and sometimes created herself. Finding the most obscure souls to help them achieve their deepest darkest desires could be a disgusting task, but back then it was so rewarding. Back then, when she thought she was loved by Satan.</p><p>While demoness and mortal walk seemingly aimlessly, back in Greendale, witches deal with avenging angels. The brunette isn’t quite privy to that info as they get back to the cottage, and Adam tells her to take a bath and relax. Locking the door, and opening the tap to fill her bath, Lilith risks traveling to Zelda, while her fiance is unknowingly cooking dinner for them both.</p><p>The mother of demons keeps herself in the shadows. She needs to see her redhead, yet she doesn’t want Zelda watching her with those clouded eyes of hers. No, that’s too painful for the brunette.  Lilith watches the redhead twirl on another dress that wouldn’t ever associate with her before getting back to the cottage, in time to prevent the flooding of her bath.</p><p>Madam Satan never feels the Dark Lord in the cottage, not only because she wasn’t there before. It’s different with him, he doesn’t really present any type of magical scent as one would expect of magical beings. Lilith always believed it was for he was an angel and falling from God’s grace hadn’t shed the entirety of his basic angelic nature, just like being kicked out of the Garden, despite the physical change, hadn’t divested her of her own basic nature.</p><p>Yet, he’s there, and she’s unassumingly eating dinner with him before she realizes it’s her Master, wearing Adam’s glamor, the one sitting in front of her. The beast doesn’t leave until she has swallowed down every piece of the mortal out of the plate, he’d served her. Lucifer doesn’t allow her to cover the tray in which Adam’s head still lays, pupils were blown open of utter horror, proof of just how short her leash truly is.</p><p>The moment he leaves, she rushes to the bathroom. Lilith feels sick. It’s not the first (or last) time she feeds of a mortal man; however, her nausea comes from what this means. The Dark Lord had found him -a mortal under her protection- and had encountered a way to overpass the ring she gave him. The meaning of it… It’s shattering for her peace of mind.</p><p>He wants her subdued, tempered to fulfill his will and only his will. With this, Lucifer reveals to her she’s no better off than she was during her life at the Garden. The demoness is his, and Satan expects her to remain repressed by his commands. A true toy for his every whim. Madam Satan cries as she’s proven once more that she’s nothing. Lilith, first woman, first witch, demoness extraordinaire, commander of Hell’s hordes, is meaningless in the grand scheme of things. Once again, those she believed as someone who would love her and protect her at all costs, like her father himself, hadn’t doubted to push her down and trample all over her fallen frame. Breaking her into shambles.</p><p>As she sobs on the bathroom floor, she thinks of Zelda. On the caring love of the redhead that’s so different from anything she felt before, and wonders not for the first time, what is going to happen once the redhead finds out who she really is. Lilith ponders if, like everyone else who she thought loved her, Zelda Spellman will also try to subdue her, to conquer her will.</p><p>Then she notices the demon that had been brought back to life perched at the bathroom’s window sill. The traitor that gave her away. She kills Stolas with a screech, and she can’t help but feel relief flooding her blood. Even if Stolas had reported back to the Dark Lord her every movement. She had kept him apart from her relationship with Zelda. ‘There’s no scape to Tibet, or anywhere else,’ she remembers, and why would he add the latter if he didn’t have his suspicions? Lilith shakes her head, feeling paranoid.</p><p>Yet, there’s that comment from Blackwood that Zelda mentioned. It was the Dark Lord’s desire for his High Priest to make Zelda his betrothed. It wasn’t so hard to figure out it was Lucifer, the one behind the redhead’s wedding. “He took away the one thing I loved, now I’ll do the same to him,” she decides.</p><p>The demoness is still dealing with the aftermath of her encounter with the Dark Lord, still planning, dotting the I’s, and crossing the t’s when she feels it. The unbalance of the powers is stronger this time… It takes her breath away and reminds her of the years before equilibrium was reached. Something is wrong, so utterly faulty, and she wonders what in heavens this could mean.</p><p>“Oh, Sabrina Spellman, what the heavens are you playing at now?” She grouses since the unbalance doesn’t seem to be diminishing but growing. The demoness doesn’t even imagine the teen has completed her death and resurrection that night. Lilith doesn’t know balance will keep messed up for the months to come, if not forevermore.</p><p>Yet, as she suffers from the pain of inequity. She feels Zelda’s own pain over this recent development, loud and clear under the fake cheerfulness she portrays because of the spell the redhead’s under. While at the desecrated church, Sabrina calls herself the Dark Lord’s sword, burning angels on a vengeance blood-red hellfire, brings the dead back to life, and heals all the wounded without the need to chant anything. Wielding power, just like Lilith is capable of since she fled the garden.</p><p>Entirely unaware of these events and the catastrophic doom they bring. The demoness must find her way around the breathlessness it leaves floating around like a perfect storm waiting to begin. Even if she manages, Lilith's feelings are out there creating havoc. Creating the stormy weather that started with her pain and falls over Greendale right through the following morning. The demoness feels utterly astonished when the day clears up anyway, despite her gloomy feelings.</p><p>Mourning the reaffirmation of the loss of herself. She chooses to blame Adam for her current emotions since she can’t fairly blame Zelda. The redhead had been nothing but apologetic and honest with her. Explaining to the demoness her reasons, her past, and truths freely to someone she doesn’t really know.  It’s easier, too, to blame the mortal, because no matter how much she loves the redhead. Lilith needs to keep Zelda’s niece from whatever the Dark Lord is preparing for her. If she fails, she needs to get rid of the child. That and Zelda Spellman is no man.</p><p>As she’s setting her own plans, Lilith cannot visit Zelda as she had promised she would the moment the redhead arrived at the Academy. The demoness wouldn’t get too far anyway, with the council in session and the Spellman teen being questioned for her so-called miracles.</p><p>If Lilith could hear Sabrina’s thoughts, she would laugh at her. The display of innocence and ‘goodness’ was a far cry from anything the Dark Lord could’ve thought for the teen’s future. However, the demoness still isn’t privy to what had transpired the previous night as she walks into a bar to lure a man into her cottage.</p><p>However, if there’s one thing that’s sure is that haughty and inflexible, Zelda Spellman is no Mary Wardwell. Her little sister knows her well enough to notice something is not right in the usual stern witch. Starting with her outfit. Hilda might be many things, but she too is a witch, and as one who had come to life at 1606 of the mortal calendar, they cautioned her about the dangers of the Caligari spell. Something she knows her mother never talked to Zelda about.</p><p>Hildegard still doesn’t know how she’s going to go about it, though. How can she save Zelda when she could barely see her that day at all? Not without requesting permission from her husband, as if her usually independent older sister was nothing but a piece of furniture. It’s just a hell send that her sister was sent to them when Sabrina was there to bring the infernal music box back to the mortuary too.</p><p>Free of her curse, Zelda reins into her emotions quickly, as she always did. Yet, as they break the Caligari spell, Lilith feels her Zelda back. The demoness stops her work to take a deep breath and control the feelings that now flow differently in her blood.  The redhead is pissed off, was furious since the damn spell started, but the brunette chuckles happily to have her temperamental witch back.</p><p>At the mortuary, Zelda gets her scotch and smoke, she’s been without either far too long for her taste. She enjoys them both as they plan their next movements. The Spellman matriarch can’t help but look in surprise as her niece wills the box away, back to her accommodations at the Academy. It’s not so outrageous. Zelda had always been able to will things to her through time and space whenever she needs them. The redhead usually just kept that skill to herself and transported things that would look menial or were easy to explain, like her cigarette box, lighters, and the occasional transporting of Sabrina’s forgotten homework when she was nothing but a forgetful child.</p><p>However, the Spellman matriarch is privy to something no one else but her Lily seems to be able to acknowledge. Zelda knows the balance is broken. She feels it in her every bone, and in the tightness of her breathing. Having heard the things Sabrina had done the previous night, it makes sense it was.</p><p>In the light of all she learned, the fact that she’s free again, and that there’s a pain on her ribcage that must come from her Lily. The redhead wants to step into the cottage and share her doubts and fears with her beloved, checking how she was and ask her why she hadn’t visited. However, it’s far too risky, now more than ever, to reveal this bond, in case Faustus had the mind to send someone to keep an eye on her. Instead, she walks back to the academy and takes a breath before she plasters a smile on her face and takes the mouse’s remains to her husband.</p><p>Delivering the brown paper bag with Ambrose’s only witness pureed inside, it’s the simple part of the night. She had always been a wonderful actor. It’s being the dutiful wife that night, as his nails bite into her skin, tearing it apart with a vengeance. Taking out on her what he can’t possibly do to her niece, that one it’s harder to swallow. She wants to kill him, to rip him to pieces so he can’t be resurrected. Instead, she plasters a fake smile on her face and thanks him for being such a good husband.</p><p>During the next witching hour, it becomes harder for her to keep her pretend. Tension rises as they are witnesses to Ambrose’s execution. Sabrina’s fake presentation of the Dark Lord is unexpected, yet no one seems to notice when she’s using her newly gained powers. No one except Zelda herself, and she’s not about to deliver her niece to the council. Yet, somehow the redhead keeps her act together, even when the Council removes Faustus from the Anti-Pope’s office as he so deserves.</p><p>Zelda Spellman is beyond herself, Ambrose is free, and Sabrina is safe.  Yet, she’s still a prisoner for the man she stupidly chose to marry. How delusional she was to think Faustus Blackwood could’ve solved anything.</p>
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<a name="section0030"><h2>30. Chapter 30</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry, it took me so long... I should be back to schedule now :D</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Sabrina. Silly, young, idealistic, Sabrina has no idea what she really is. Lilith knows, she had always known that the girl was destined to become the Herald of Hell. She had listened closely all about the Shadow-girl as the Codex Prognostica was being written for the first time. Tortured out of the Angels who refused to follow Lucifer’s lead and had fallen prey to Lilith’s cunning and strategical mind, not to mention her charm.</p><p>When the union of Edward Spellman and Diana Sawyer was agreed upon, Lilith knew the Apocalypse was near. She knew there wouldn’t be long until she, the Dawn before Doom, had to appear on the mortal realm to prepare the Herald of Hell for her position, and finally, she would be given the place she had always deserved and had been taunted with for so long. Now, she sits waiting for her monster to appear, because she’s sure there’s more to Sabrina Spellman than her master had given away.</p><p>The mother of demons smiles. She will take what’s rightfully hers. She will take what Lucifer loves the most and no, that’s not the child but his ego-boosted power. The demoness is going to use her monster to scare Sabrina, trap her, kill her if it happens -she doesn’t really care- and then Lilith will overthrow the Dark Lord, the fake God only knew how… yet. She’ll figure it out, eventually.</p><p>It’s a knock on Lilith’s door later, and now Sweet Sabrina is looking at her with expecting eyes, wishing for her to give her some hope, perhaps? Where there’s none. At least, not of the kind the teen longs. She will become the Herald of Hell, the doors of Hell will be thrown open, and then the demoness will find a way to get the crown. Her crown.</p><p>Keeping her composure through it all proves to be a complex task. The balance is broken, and even if she’s starting to get used to the breathlessness, it brings. It’s Zelda’s feelings that make it all that much harder.  But having survived a lot, Lilith manages. Although, it’s not so hard to fill their young heads with words as she looks at the drawing they came with.</p><p>It’s the ‘I’m not sure I can be killed,” that Sabrina lets out, that makes the demoness flinch. If the teen can’t kill herself and fulfill the last perversion… the Gates of Hell will remain closed and thus, she too will remain unable to get back unless summoned or banished, neither option quite appealing since it would mean a certain punishment for her failure. The mandrake spell is the first thing she thinks of and pushes the idea into the white-headed girl. She knows the teen will sacrifice her powers, most likely asking for no one’s help.</p><p>Nicholas Scratch, like most men, can present himself as a nuisance. Lilith is aware of this. She notices he doesn’t quite believe her, and if he stuck with the girl… There’s no telling if the warlock could convince the teen witch and stop Sabrina from divesting herself of her powers and release them to the universe. Hopefully, the latter will also finally restore the equilibrium too.</p><p>Back at the academy, Zelda still is in one piece, or so she hopes. When morning comes, she has more issues pretending, as Faustus unloads a ton of lies to kick-start his own reign of misogyny and corruption. His own kingdom.</p><p>Clenching her jaw, the redhead prays for Lilith’s help. Not that it had ever worked for her before, but since she’s the one image against misogyny, as a survivalist on her own right, so Zelda hopes for some sort of help from the Goddess/Demoness. Although, she’s not surprised when nothing happens.</p><p>The Spellman matriarch worries. When she’s finally left alone for a couple of minutes, she must choose wisely. She wants to call Lily. Between the two options, the excommunicated with most likely could help her stop this nonsense. Hilda; however, seems the more political approach, since her little sister can summon the council whereas the brunette cannot. She’s almost caught by Faustus, who at her answer almost pounces on her, barely giving her time to hide the smell of her cigarette. Almost an hour later, the marks on her back are fresh and painful as she slides back into the dress with a soft smile on her face.  At least, she has not given away her act.</p><p>Not until a few hours later... until Prudence… That girl who is too smart for her own good, blind to Faustus’s plans, but intelligent, nonetheless. Sadly, like every Blackwood before her, she’s also power-driven. It was part of the things Zelda knows about Father Blackwood. It was the thread she had used back in their youth to attract him. It’s also what she used to get to where she is today.</p><p>The betrayal of his daughter against her own sister is not something Zelda had forethought. Prudence Night could’ve been many things, but the eldest Spellman always thought of her as loyal to her sisters. Yet, it seems she was mistaken. Sweet Leticia is there, in his office. Still alive, at least, as they discover the redhead’s act. Her powers are bound, and she’s thrown into the stupid witch cell soon after. The Spellman matriarch doesn’t even try to free herself. Zelda can feel her magic, and the few remaining stronger threads aren’t enough even to transport herself out. Thus, she waits for whatever punishment her husband can find for her, any hope for freeing herself comes from the second she’s out of the doors and not yet under his control.</p><p>The only thing that she can strongly feel is her Lily. That for some reason feels trapped, breathless. She can’t even imagine that it’s a mix of the balance being utterly overthrown, beyond what it was before, and Nick Scratch keeping her bound by a spell attached to her rib.</p><p>Sabrina has left hours ago, and yet, the warlock keeps Lilith tightly bound, wondering what’s going on in this witch’s mind to keep herself sitting so quietly. He can only see her flinch whenever he tightens the binding on her rib.  </p><p>“Who are you?” Nick dares to ask. “Why aren’t you fighting over this restrain?” Lilith wants to chuckle. Yet, she’s not fighting the restraint, mostly because she’s fighting with everything else going underneath her skin. Besides Zelda’s worries and fears.</p><p>Lilith felt this recent change in the balance. It doesn’t come from Sabrina; she reckons, but from something much older. It’s attached to whatever or whoever they created to atone for the demoness blood signature on the book of the beast. As if the keeper has been killed or bound… made powerless or broken. “Who do you think I am, boy?” she answers with a question of her own.</p><p>“A witch who bit more than she could chew,” he almost spits back, giving the rib one more turn with the thread. Lilith laughs, wholeheartedly. She sometimes wishes she was just a witch, but she’s not.</p><p>“Says the warlock holding said witch with a half heartfelt spell,” the demoness mocks as she allows him to feel some more of the extent of her power and how even if she’s physically bound by his hex, Lilith still can wield her magic if she wanted to.</p><p>“What are you?” Nickolas tries again. “Why don’t you free yourself?” He wonders.</p><p>“Ah, physical magic is powerful. I could break it, but what good would it make? You are going to teleport yourself to wherever I land, and we will be more spent yet in the same act,” she explains boringly. If the mother of demons was honest, she would tell him that any other day, she could break this silly entrapment of his with a blink of her eye. However, magic is so unstable that she knows it might backfire on her. Or Zelda, who is still attached to her. Nicholas is shocked for a second when he feels her power. Knowing with certainty that Sabrina’s teacher is right to assume she could stop him if she wanted to.</p><p>He tries to distract her, to gain time after that. So, the young warlock confesses to having found Sabrina’s prophecy. “Why don’t you read me this prophecy you found?” She knows it by heart. Lilith knows that Sabrina is out there finding her other half to kill herself and by doing so, completing her part on the prophecy written for her.</p><p>Nick questions her about her knowledge of it. For him, it’s obvious she knows it. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be an explanation as to why she was the one whispering in Sabrina’s ear. Yet, what surprises him the most about this bound witch is that even with the limitations, her question is not a request but a compulsion. A powerful spell that makes him impossible to say no. Giving her one look, Nick reads it.</p><p>“We should stop her.” The warlock says after Lilith explains to him what was about to happen. How his girlfriend is about to doom them all. “Yes. We should. Release me,” she says then. It wasn’t a compulsion, but a request. He hesitates, this Ms. Wardwell has played Sabrina to perfection, walking her down the path of night. Keeping them all in the shadows about her plans -he still has no idea what those entail- “I want to stop this as much as you do,” the demoness whispers. She’s saying the truth, he decides, before he releases her.</p><p>She rushes out of her cottage faster than he thought possible for someone who has just been freed from a magical bound and is running through the woods in a tight leather jacket and high heels. However, he almost has issues following her. Until she halts, collapsing against a tree.</p><p>“What?” He starts, but she raises her hand to stop his questioning. “This would be an excellent moment for a location spell, Mr. Scratch,” she interrupts him.</p><p>The thing is, that whatever was wrong with the other part of balance has just been restored. The demoness must get herself comfortable with the mix of the previous equilibrium plus Sabrina’s unbalancing force that remains still untamed. “Where to?” She asks, taking a deep breath and then another one.</p><p>As she follows the warlock, she can’t help to think they are going to a place she knows all too damn well. She rushes past him, sensing they are going to Sabrina’s birthplace. The same place where she found Lucifer all those millennia ago. “You know? This could be a good thing, too,” Nick shouts over his shoulder as they rush through the woods.</p><p>“What could?” The mother of demons asks confused as to why this pesky warlock would think the Dawn of Apocalypse could be something ‘good’.</p><p>“This… Sabrina being the Devil’s sword… Hell’s herald… Of course… Provided that Lilith….” He continues shouting between his panting; however, she stops dead in her tracks as she hears her name.</p><p>“Provided that Lilith, what?” The demoness asks, her hand grabbing him by the collar as he trips against her. “Speak boy, I don’t have all night.”</p><p>“When I was doing my research. Before I found the half-shadow footnote. I found another one… Tied to… Sabrina’s, or so I believe,” he says. Lilith racks her head, trying to remember anything at all that related to that prophecy or to herself. She has a fleeting memory of Ananiel’s warning. One, she doesn’t have time to revisit as the boy keeps talking. “I don’t remember all the aspects of it, nor I believe it was complete. It said that the Devil’s sword would only appear when Lilith and the heir of Earth bonded in psyche and they could fix the mess.”</p><p>She snorts. “Lilith’s bonded with the heir in psyche? I’m guessing it meant soul. Adam died centuries after she fled the garden. Don’t make me laugh, boy.” The demoness shakes her head, amused by this. “If that’s so, at least your prophecy isn’t incorrect, just took it millennia to reach the part where the Devil’s sword made her appearance.”  She laughs as she continues walking towards their destination.</p><p>“There’s no need to mock me, I’m just sharing what I’ve read,” Nicholas adds, shaking his head at this strange witch before following her. “All I’m saying is we need Lilith. We should summon her.”</p><p>“And tell her what?” The demoness chuckles again. “Hey, Dark Mother, have you reunited with your husband yet? ‘Coz Sabrina Spellman is about to make Lucifer Morningstar human again and start Hell on Earth?”</p><p>“For someone who said to have studied with Nostradamus, you are quick to judge,” Nick rolls his eyes. “If you didn’t, you’ll know by now it spoke not only about the Devil’s sword. It also said the heir must change and with his help, they will restore the balance and bring about a new era,” He adds. Lilith stops again, looking positively peeved. Disturbed and annoyed. The winds rise to answer her rage, and it leaves the warlock astoundingly looking at her.</p><p>“Right… Of course, the Fake God would drop that on Lilith too!” She shouts angrily, looking to the skies. “Cast her away, but get your damned child to fix the balance too! Oh, but only if she finds her BF!”  Not quite understanding why she’s so disturbed by any of it. Nick shrugs. “We should summon her after we stop Sabrina from killing herself, or even if we don’t.”</p><p>Ms. Wardwell surprises him for the thousandth time that night, by letting out a tired sigh. The demoness presses the bridge of her nose and takes a deep breath. “I am right here, boy. I was here all along,” she confesses in a whisper.</p><p>“You are…” He says, noticing quickly that he’s in the presence of someone he admires. He drops to his knees.</p><p>“Yes, I’m Lilith. But good luck with fulfilling that prophecy of yours, Mr. Scratch,” she adds. Her mind for once providing her with an image of the Adams’.  The first one with his eerie looks and that gaze she saw not so long ago, in Blackwood’s eyes. The last one, with those dull blue eyes that were always lovingly looking at her, a mirage of who he thought she was. She felt a pang of... something… tugging at her heart. “Rise, child. We have no time to lose.”</p><p>“Allow me to ask then, Dark Mother. How is Sabrina’s prophecy coming to fruition? If as I infer you haven’t found your other half? Perhaps, we will be able to reach Sabrina and stop her from killing her mandrake. If your prophecy isn’t completed, then won’t that mean doomsday wouldn’t be today.” He dares to wonder. Lilith chuckles.</p><p>“What good would it make, if I’ve found him, and now he’s dead? Killed by the Dark Lord himself? What hope remains?” She asks, not a hint of a feeling in her voice.</p><p>“Then we are screwed. But we won’t let him take Sabrina, that’s for sure, Dark Mother.” Lilith wants to laugh at him, she just smiles. She’s been there before, hoping against all hope that the Dark Lord wouldn’t fulfill his plans. Or the whipping, the torture, the violent acts against her because she was too damn rebellious at the end of the day. Until she was no more. Until everything that was left was a carcass of herself that didn’t even look like the being she had been once. She was no more the beautiful redheaded vessel that walked naked and unpreoccupied in the garden, and not even near famished yet strong brunette who survived the wastelands for so long.</p><p>“Whatever it happens, boy. Do not tell her who I am. I’ll tell her myself.” She leaves out as they near the clearing.</p><p>“I can respect that, Dark Mother.”</p><p>“Good,” She says morosely, thinking what will happen with her relationship with Zelda Spellman now that she is running out of time and her truth will need to come out to the light.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0031"><h2>31. Chapter 31</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There’s no change in the chaos of the lost balance. The demoness can see the mortal Sabrina Spellman holding her former magical self. Her recently gained powers now float amidst the woods instead of being contained in the girl’s vessel. It’s highly depressing for Lilith to know the unbalance caused by Sabrina’s part in this, hadn’t settled either.</p><p>“<em>Hear me, Lilith. The day will come that the balance will be restored, and then, one day, you’ll find what you’ve always longed for. Soon after that time, the balance will be broken again. When the latter happens, the prophecies will be fulfilled. You will become the Dawn before doom, and only with perfect balance, there will be a future for your kind. Your father has spoken.”</em> Ananiel’s voice mixes in Lilith’s head with the little Mr. Scratch’s had added to her knowledge. The tome of tomes is still laying forgotten at Mary’s cottage and she will search for this prophecy the boy mentioned, before trying to face the Spellman’s without getting killed in the attempt. She chuckles, ‘Lilith, first woman, first witch, Satan’s concubine afraid of three witches and a mortal teen…’ she thinks. Although, she knows she's deluding herself and it's just one of them the one that scares her.</p><p>“The prophecy is being fulfilled,” the mother of demons lets out to the three young witches that are in the clearing, yet not sure to which prophecy she’s referring to. Ananiel’s announcement said the disturbance would start once she found what she longed for. The demoness wonders for a second if that homey feeling around Adam Masters is what the angel was referring to. She had always longed for someone to care for her, and the mortal had done that. ‘He,’ had said Nicholas Scratch, and of course, it would be a ‘he’ and not Zelda, her father would make sure of that. However, there was a shift in the equilibrium -albeit temporarily- long before Adam arrived in her life. What could that mean? Was the annoying angel talking about the temporary unbalance or the lasting one as she felt it now? Strong and unrelenting against her, as if it wanted something more from her.</p><p>It didn’t really matter, she decided, after all the balance was utterly lost, and had been intermittently lost for months. Started right since she pushed Sabrina to sign her name on the book Lilith herself had started, and finally settled in chaos for good, once the teen had re-birthed. “The end of days is upon us. The Dark Lord will walk the Earth in His true form. The Gates of Hell will open, and you will sit by His side and rule… as His Queen,” Lilith announces, unable to stop herself.</p><p>She’s the dawn before doom, thus, it’s her announcement to make. No matter how much it pains her, how much she feels betrayed once more. However, there’s this nagging feeling inside her mind that she’s wrong about something. As many times before, she pushes it down, squashing any hopes. No one cares about her state of mind, no one ever cared about her... Not until Zelda, and Lilith knows she’s close to losing that too.</p><p>The demoness finds herself surprised when the young Scratch lets her go without saying who she is. It’s the title, she knows, as Satan’s handmaiden what stops him from spewing the beans about her truest form. And perhaps some fear as to how Sabrina will take in this additional information he has. ‘Ah, silly young love,’ she shakes her head.</p><p>With little thought, she transports herself to the cottage. Truly, the only thing she wants to do is call Zelda to cuddle up to her, so the redhead could fix what she didn’t know was broken. Lilith, however, is afraid of the things she must disclose. She’s terrified of what Sabrina might or might not have told her aunties before she came chasing her. The demoness finds her long-forgotten rib laying atop the book, and rushes to heal the bone back in place, hoping it wouldn’t cause more pain than needed to the redhead she still must face.</p><p>Gently running a finger over the cover of the Codex Prognostica, - a copy, she reckons- the first witch decides she can’t face it... Not yet. Not without seeing her first, before she confirms that this beautiful thing they shared was to be cut short when the redhead is replaced in Lilith’s life by someone’s heir. Without her consent and by some twisted magic from the creators.</p><p>She thinks about the mortal man again, and how his presence in her house had kept her from Zelda. Nevermind prophecies, Lilith decides she’s not that strong to face a life without the caring touches of her redhead. So, she transports herself to the Spellman mortuary. Lurking in one shadowy corner of Zelda’s room. The bursting energy of her nearness shakes the mother of demons to the core. It feels like the balm she needs to move forward. It’s not quite surprising when the Spellman witch she longs for opens the door, searching frantically for her.</p><p>“There you are,” the eldest Spellman says the moment her green eyes find her hiding in the corner. In three long strides, she’s engulfing Lilith in a bear hug, hiding her face in the curve of the demoness’ neck and breathing her in. “I've missed you. All the existing and fake deities know just how much I have,” the Spellman matriarch whispers, her words muffled by the way she’s holding onto the mother of demons as a lifeline of sorts.  “Things have been so chaotic, love… And will become even worse,” Zelda says caressing a memorized sharp cheek with one hand and placing a kiss where neck and shoulders meet.</p><p>The demoness doesn’t know Zelda is thinking about Hilda’s possible near death. One not caused by her hands. Still, at her words, Lilith straightens, feeling the guilt of what she can’t find words to say. “Zelda… Love… I…” Lilith starts, but the redhead is having none, quieting her with a soft kiss and looking at her adoringly, making her feel worthy of something more than just the punishment surely awaits her once she finds her master.</p><p>“No… We don’t have enough time, Lily… I rather not waste it chatting about the wrongdoings of others when we can steal it for ourselves for once. Won’t you agree?”  Zelda asks because she can’t help but keep constantly asking if this woman agrees with her. Doubting of herself, and how she could be so lucky to have gotten someone so special like her Lily.</p><p>Icy blues look at those green’s that say so much more than the words Zelda Spellman already uttered. The brunette can’t help but rest her forehead against hers, sighing as she fights with the pain she certainly will suffer when the redhead stops looking at her like this -like her Lily- and starts seeing her like the bitch behind Sabrina’s downfall.</p><p>For the first time in her long life, the demoness doesn’t know how she will survive if she faces Zelda’s hate. She chooses not to dwell on it, instead, she kisses her Zelda passionately, fiercely. While trying to convey all the feelings the redhead surely has felt before, running deep, steady, and fearlessly beneath her skin, and that Lilith has yet to say it out loud.</p><p>The sun is coming out, tinting the skies of bright oranges and purples that shine softly throughout half-open curtains, shining on Zelda’s hair and making it look like a halo of fire. It reminds her of the first time she saw hell and fell in love with the place. The walk from the clearing to the Spellman Mortuary isn’t a long one, two witches and the mortal she left being should arrive shortly to confess what can’t remain hidden for long.</p><p>Lilith launches herself forward, tangling her hand in amber strands and bringing the witch so close that she could meld into the demoness old bones. In seconds that feel like hours, they are both lying naked in Zelda’s bed. Her door magically locked from the inside, soundproofing the room just in case. Even though through years of shouldered violence in their lives, none of them are really screamers, anymore. Still, internal walls are thin enough and Zelda was always too damn private on her matters.</p><p>Although she feels Zelda’s magic being used, Lilith couldn’t care less for either spell that leaves her. She’s too enthralled working with her hands up and down, memorizing the eagerly available curves as pale hands move in haste over her own skin. Kisses are fast and hungry as if they are really running out of time. Nips, licks, wet kisses mark their path of fire downwards at the same time. Glorious fingers find their way inside and hips mold to the rhythm of their sacred dance, marked by lavishing tongues that whisper ancient secrets between moist folds. Their passion consumes them, yet it’s overpowered by the love that flows deeply underneath their skins. Marking the other as theirs, and theirs alone.</p><p>As they come together as one, Lilith cries. Sad, thick tears fall from her eyes and find themselves mixed with Zelda’s salty sweat. As if they belong in the redhead skin as much as the demoness feels she herself does. They pant as they leave kisses behind on their thighs and then, finally; they find the strength to sit straight in the bed, curling up together. Hands find hair, caressing it softly, reverently. Before a languid kiss gives way to a peck and their foreheads resting into one another. Hands clasping the other tight enough to let them know they aren’t ready to let go. They aren’t ready to leave.</p><p>It’s the noise coming from the outside, from three boisterous youngsters as they approach the mortuary that breaks them apart. “I should go.” Lilith whisper, placing one short lingering kiss on swollen lips. As she does, the demoness waves her hand and they are both dressed as if the last minutes hadn’t happened at all. Yet, marks remain in both, the path of fire of the other’s touch, forever branded in their skins, seared in their souls.</p><p>“Why is it that it always looks like we are rushing away from each other?” Zelda wonders loudly as she stands up and brings the demoness close again. Lilith chuckles. “I believe that I’ve said something about considering we’re always returning instead of always leaving, haven’t I, love?” The demoness whispers against tempting lips.</p><p>“Precisely, darling,” Zelda agrees as pecks the soft lips once more. “And I promised I’ll always come back for you. No matter what.” Lilith's heart breaks, because she knows it will be in hours’ time that the loving eyes will look at her differently. “Zelda, love…” she searches in those green pools, trying to convey all she can’t say. Placing a strand of amber hair behind her ear and lingering a second too long. “Darling, I relieve you from that promise,” the demoness lets out, kissing her deeply, her salty tears mixing into it. Before she can’t let go, Lilith bites her love’s lower lip tenderly, disappearing from the room without another word, and Zelda is left to contemplate what the heavens that could mean.</p><p>It won’t take Zelda that long to understand it.</p><p>The Spellman matriarch walks downstairs where she had left Hilda. They exchange a glance that says nothing much about what had happened in Zelda’s room or why she had so desperately rushed away. Yet, the conversation between sisters that was meant to be postponed is quickly erased from their minds with the recent information that pours from the youngster’s trio. Not even Hilda’s issue with having killed Methuselah is as grave as the one that blurts out from the two youngest Spellman and the boyfriend.</p><p>“Ms. Wardwell manipulated me into fulfilling a prophecy, one that’s meant to bring about the end of the world,” Sabrina says at once, Zelda feels the need to hold herself to something, but she remains stoically standing as the trio goes on. She can’t believe her Lily would do something like that. No, it makes little sense. Yet, the brunette kept telling her to do what she must and that she, too, would do what she had to. Maybe this was the thing she was referring to all along.</p><p>But why? The redhead thinks. Sabrina Spellman is a mortal now. The sixteen years old, it’s meant to rule by the Dark Lord’s side. Her Lily knew this and helped Sabrina to reach this point. As heartbreaking as this is for herself, Zelda Spellman will protect her niece at all costs… even if her heart is the price. She had done it once, and she’ll do it anytime her family needed her to.</p><p>They work hard to raise the wards, place iron spikes, horseshoes and garlic to keep the Dark Lord away from her. Yet, the teen has no better idea than send her mortal friends to help. “That girl will be the death of me,” Zelda mumbles, and Hilda chuckles.</p><p>“We’ve survived sixteen years, Zelds, and I can’t remember one when you haven’t said something of the like,” the blonde grins. Then stops her sister, “what was that earlier, love? You ran away as if there was a fire in the house.”</p><p>“Nothing, Hildie. Whatever it was… It’s over now,” she says sadly. Hilda can feel the overwhelming grief in Zelda’s words. Yet, she doesn’t quite understand where they come from. “Zelds? What aren’t you telling me?”</p><p>“Don’t eat your heart out, Hilda, as I’ve said. It’s over,” the redhead states firmly, a reminiscence of Zelda’s sternness before whatever it had brought the change in her older sister. In the years they’ve lived together, Hilda has learned when she could push for more, when the conversation was over, or when it could kill her if she went on. This one fell into the latter without a doubt.</p><p>Back at the Gray room, Lilith is a mess. As a demoness, she prided herself on being cold-blooded and imperturbable. She was the mother of demons, for crying out loud! Yet, here she was, fighting her human-like feelings (her own and Zelda’s) that confuse her beyond anything else. The first woman will never admit to having to deal with such a pointless thing as emotions. However, like most damaged people, she feels them deeply, and these... These are far more profound and solemn than any she’d felt before.</p><p>As she walks closer to the being that made her fall into herself, Lilith feels an immense hatred growing inside her. She notices that her master might look like the stunning creature who had fallen out of Heaven. The one she saved and healed… Yet, there’s nothing in there that she likes or needs anymore… Save for his title.</p><p>The demoness dares to question him and his plans for Sabrina Spellman. Lilith truly can’t find anything -beyond the extreme youth- that the girl can do better than she could. She doesn’t even mind Dorian Gray overhearing this chat of theirs. He, like Faustus, had always known who she was, both for the same reason… The demoness was the one in charge of sealing their deals (as every other deal for a soul).  However, before the Dark Lord answers her questions, the blond warlock makes himself scarce.</p><p>Yeah, she liked Dorian Gray. The mother of demons considered him a smart fella right from the beginning when they were forging his deal. “Bring me Sabrina Spellman,” Lucifer orders her, after throwing a veiled menace of a punishment to come. Lilith can read between the lines. She’s been there too many times to remember them all, yet knows what he will do to her if she cannot bring the child.</p><p>She teleports herself close to the mortuary, far away enough that her link to Zelda doesn’t tingle. Lilith is not ready to face what must happen inside, but she’s tried everything before and what difference would it make? The child is a mortal, and mortals wither and die in a blink of an eye… The demoness decides she doesn’t even have to kill the child, she only must wait for seventy or eighty years… a hundred tops, and that’s nothing for someone like her who’s doomed to live until the Earth explodes into thousands of pieces.</p><p>Shaking herself, she squares her shoulders and transfers to the entry hall. She hears Ambrose Spellman’s silly plan. The brunette wonders if the warlock has any idea of what his auntie did to prevent him to have to live a life in the run, as he now suggests for his cousin. ‘Zelda was so right back then, there’s no escaping the Dark Lord,’ she thinks.</p><p>“It’ll do no good to run,” she says, letting out a sigh. “Believe me, I’ve tried.” It’s not until she leaves those words out that, wacko link of powers and all, Zelda finally turns to watch her. Of course, it’s the mortal teen, the one to put up a fight.</p><p>Contradictory feelings once again make themselves present, threatening to weaken her. Then, it’s her Zelda standing up, questioning what’s going on and why is Sabrina attacking her favorite teacher now. No, the redhead hadn’t believed in her niece’s words when she said her Lily had been pushing her to the path to Apocalypse. But, to Lilith’s dismay, the teen who can be so oblivious knows how to get her Aunt’s attention swiftly. A mention of plotting against the Spellman and predictably Zelda’s on her feet, ready to attack.</p><p>The redhead’s magic simmers in the room, taking it all in one swift motion. Unpredictably, Lilith’s magic follows it, joining it. The demoness knows there’s no way back from what must happen now. Three Spellmans raise their magic against her. Yet, their combined powers make Zelda’s magic crackle with energy.</p><p>As she can also feel the unbalance of the powers of the universe, most likely Zelda is suffering the same effects that come from it, the demoness theorized. Lilith considers for a second that it also might be the connection of theirs. That it is a way to show her that even though Zelda Spellman looks ready to kill her, the redhead’s magic bound to her own, it’s ready to protect her. The energetic crackling the demoness sees comes from where the matriarch’s magic collides with the energy of the two witches.</p><p>“I’m not a witch,” she says, looking at her Zelda. Waiting for the moment, the love she still sees shimmering profoundly in the deep green mysteries of her eyes morphs into something else. “Well, not only a witch,” her words come out saddened, weighted down by what she’s losing again. “Then who the heaven are you?” The kid defies her. “You yourself, Sabrina, walked in my shoes... If only for a night.”</p><p>Then it happens, “you’re Lilith?” The child wonders, not quite believing her. Their stance change, their casting positions changed. The demoness’s own power gets back to her as Zelda’s magical barrier is lowered.</p><p>“Lilith?” they all ask at once, yet it’s the redhead’s voice, the one she recognizes strongly, and her troubled emotions the ones she feels underneath her skin. The demoness can’t help to give her a soft smile. Before Sabrina snaps, blabbering about her teacher, wondering about childish things that have no place in the grand scheme of things.</p><p>“Why on Earth?” the oldest auntie asks, Lilith knows the question is for her, yet she’s saved by Sabrina. Soon, she is placing her hand over the youngest Spellman shoulder and picking her familiar from the ground, Lilith risks one last glance to Zelda Spellman before she disappears into thin air. As she does…. Agony breaks loose underneath her skin.</p>
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<a name="section0032"><h2>32. Chapter 32</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Fire burned orange, blue and green, licking the almost translucent skin of the body that was awkwardly hung on the pole. Hands tied together and strung high above her head, her shoulders just moments away from dislocating themselves from the sheer weight of the body suspended from the bonds.</p><p>The sky was dark, and there was not one star shimmering in the sky, and the moon was blackened. The woods eerily silent and the winds howling as if in sadness. The female body shone brightly in contrast with the fire licking her skin. Scalding it on a violent red. Marring it. Burning it. Blackening it beyond a chance of recognition. The fire was so bright and alive, and the woman was ablaze, making it almost impossible to notice the darkened blood pouring from a wound at her side, right where her floating rib should be.</p><p>It had taken thirteen of the most powerful warlocks to contain her. One of them coiling a thread around the middle of a puppet that resembled the woman now being burned alive enough to bind her. Four of them kept her physically bound, and another two tied her, while one dug into her side and broke the rib out of her body. The remaining ones were casting protection spells to keep the ones doing the work safely.</p><p>Now, in a circle around the pole, along with the one working the puppet; a second warlock had the woman’s rib on hand, twining a harsh thread against it to keep her securely bound. All thirteen of them reciting incantations to keep her from saving herself from this fate. Even when it was a long while since the smoke had rendered her unconscious.</p><p>In their eager pride and desperate need of recognition, they had made one fatal mistake. They summoned the Dark Lord, thinking their deed was worthy of him.</p><p>Not willing to deal with pitiful claims of whatever these kids wanted to show off now, he had sent Lilith on their way.</p><p>It wasn’t the first time the demoness had seen women burning. It wasn’t the first time the mother of demons saw feared women receiving the worst side of the men’s cowardice. Lilith knew this one wouldn’t be the last one either. This one, though… There was something utterly wrong with the image painted around this one.</p><p>Lilith crooked her head slightly, skeleton eyes shining in the dark. Looking around, she understood easily what was going on. Thirteen cowardly warlocks were burning a genuine witch. One of their own. She felt betrayed beyond reason. There were plenty of ways to mercifully kill a witch. Why were they torturing her in the worst of the ways? She knew how painful it was. Waving her hand, she took one man from the circle and willed him to speak. “Why are you burning a witch, warlock?”</p><p>“She... They found her with books that no witch should ever read!” The man had stuttered. Lilith raised an unamused eyebrow when the man wet his robe under her control. She looked around to the now frozen warlocks, the one with the puppet keeping his thread tightly bound.</p><p>“Is it true that the cause of her demise is reading?” Lilith asked loudly, nothing happened.  “Answer me!” She screeched. Disturbed by it, a murder flew away, cawing loudly as if complaining to her for her lateness and inaction.</p><p>“Yes, Madam Satan.” Thirteen voices responded at once. Something burned inside her. Maybe the betrayal of many millennia. Perhaps the way the head lolled down, and bright rose-gold hair that was previously long and well-tended, coiled into itself, blackening to finally burn to ashes as the fire touched it. Perchance it was the way previously soft-looking cheeks turned into a fiery red and then morphed into dark black where the flames licked her face. Or it could be the way the body was tortured by men who were terrified of her, just like she was for millennia.</p><p>Whatever it was, seeing this woman abused like that brought something primitive out of her. A resentment she hadn’t felt in years. A rage she had learned to control, if only not to get on the wrong side of her Master. Lilith knew exactly what it felt to be placed at the stake and burned. Not by witches, yet she had been there unaccounted times. And whereas he had placed her there, Lucifer had never allowed her to die. He always stopped the flames when she was about to take her last breath. When the fire had burned her skin until it remained nothing more than blisters over wounds and it had taken her days, if not months, to recover from the wounds the experiences had created.</p><p>The demoness looked up once more, to golden-rose hair that reminded her of herself. In the old days, even before the wastelands, when she still was Adam’s mate; when she wasn’t a cast away and her father hadn’t transformed her into a dull brunette.</p><p>Painful memories floated out of their hidden place and Lilith screeched, loudly. Wolves and earthbound demons howling along with her from the four corners of the Earth. One by one, the warlocks exploded into pieces, save for one that, after looking at her in panic, ran for his life. She could find him and deal with him later, she decided. Only one thing remained to be done.</p><p>Lilith approached the fire, killed it with a wave, and with another one, lowered the damaged witch to her arms. There was nothing recognizable on the witch by then. Her features hidden under blisters and burns. Still, the witch was alive, her breathing shallow and her pulse weak. Taking a deep breath of relief, which surprised her. The demoness transported the two of them to one place she knew they would save the witch.</p><p>In a blink of an eye, Lilith covered herself with the glamor of her first human vessel, the one He created her with. Her long fiery red hair flared down to her waist. Pale olive skin replaced her green one, as icy blue eyes took the skeletons’ place in her orbital plates. To complete her appearance, a long white robe trimmed with golden embroidering dressed her form, and a golden tiara sat on her head.</p><p>The charred witch remained unmoving in her arms. The mother of demons heard the prayers to her father loudly the moment she appeared inside the walls of Saint Brigid of Kildare abbey. She knew Brigid wouldn’t mind her for what she came to do. The former Goddess Brigid, converted to Saint, was after all the Mother of Healers. Except for Brigid’s green eyes, her depiction in the mortal world shared enough similarities to Lilith’s first form for her to be a passable Brigid for the night.</p><p>The witch moaned in her arms and the demoness couldn’t help to send a quick healing spell that would keep her alive until they could provide help. Once the demoness was reassured the woman in her care was breathing, she followed the noise and reached the place of worship. “She needs your help,” Lilith said loudly, hoping to interrupt the prayers.</p><p>The voices stopped their prayers at once. Turning around to find out what they could only be described as an appearance of their Saint Matron. “Don’t stay there on your knees, help her!” Lilith shouted, feeling some desperation taking a hold of her without really knowing why. After her outburst, the women stood quickly from their knees and led their Matriarch to a room. Others went for ointments and one searched for the Mother Abbess.</p><p>“Blessed Brigid,” the mother abbess said once she spotted the Mother of Demons in her glamour. Lilith smiled, allowing the old creature on uncomfortable looking clothes to grab her hand and kiss her knuckles in reverence.</p><p>“This creature needs your help,” she stated firmly. “She will survive and will heal faster than any mortal you’ve healed before. I’ve made sure of that,” Lilith added, pointing to the woman in the bed.</p><p>“We will take care of her, Blessed Mother,” the abbess nodded. With a slight nod of acknowledgment, Lilith left before Lucifer reclaimed her and punished her. The demoness never knew what had happened to that witch. She might never know. One thing Lilith always wondered was why that witch hadn’t prayed to her. She would’ve come to rescue her.</p><p>Is the image of the hanging witch being burned to death as lesser warlocks work together to keep her bounded fearing for their lives because she seemed to be stronger than them. That’s the image that appears in her mind when Sabrina asks her why she’s still serving the Dark Lord.</p><p>Fear, she realizes, to be burned, tortured, abused beyond recognition. Totally forgotten and most likely unheard of for anyone who cares about her. That, granted, they aren’t that many. Her own creator pushed her to the side. Her husband, made of the same clay as she was, complained every step of the way and was long gone now. Her supposed love and protector was the one responsible for inflicting all the damage she knew. Her demons, well… She couldn’t expect love from them, could she? And Zelda Spellman… Lilith shook her head. She wondered if Zelda Spellman would ever think of her in the same way again.</p><p>She answers, “it’s all I’ve ever known,” instead, because explaining to someone so entitled that actions have consequences will do nothing to the teen. Since Sabrina Spellman seems to have been born with a silver spoon in her mouth. Even when Lilith knows her Aunts' tried to keep her grounded.</p><p>The demoness doesn’t even flinch when the kid spews that her excuse is pathetic. What could a sixteen years old, that despite losing her parents, had grown in a loving home, who has friends that accept her for who she is, and people who would die for her know about a life of abuse? When Sabrina had barely learned what rejection was after her mortal boyfriend had ended up their relationship a few months back with enough valid reasons to keep her away for a lifetime.</p><p>Lilith takes the child to Lucifer and remains in the dark, listening to it all. It surprises her, too, when she learns Sabrina Spellman is in reality Sabrina Morningstar. This scene developing in front of her is the last stab the demoness needs to comprehend where she really lays in Lucifer’s grand scheme of things. She’s nothing more than a fuckable handmaiden, little more than a slave.</p><p>Back at the mortuary, the Spellman’s are still trying to find a way to stop the Apocalypse. Zelda’s morose expression is heartbreaking. Ambrose does stop from his readings to walk to her to place a hand over his Auntie’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Auntie Zee,” he whispers. Ambrose knows his Auntie is trying hard not to crash and break under the sheer weight of discovering the Lily he had mocked her for, and she had smiled lovingly at, was in fact their Lilith. Who as she was enamoring her, their demoness was also paving Sabrina’s way and Earth’s path to perdition.</p><p>The heartbreak she can face, despite appearances Zelda has been there before and has picked the pieces of her heart enough times to know how to face them. It’s the lies that make her uncomfortable and the fact that’s not just any woman but their deity’s left hand.</p><p>As someone who keeps so many secrets of her own. Zelda can’t say she doesn’t understand the position Lilith was in. However, the doubt that lingers and weighs heavily in her heart. The one that preoccupied her the most is simple. If she already doubted being enough for Lily, what could Zelda Spellman possibly be to Lilith? If not, one of her many devotees across the world. One privileged enough to have shared her bed, pleasuring her and being pleasured by her in the most carnal of the ways. Loving her in ways she had never dared to love anyone else.</p><p>Then Sabrina’s back. Telling them she’s not rightfully a Spellman but Lucifer’s child. There’s Hilda, too, her sweet little sister, confessing as to Diana’s fears. Yet, for once in her lifetime, Zelda knows exactly where Sabrina stands. Not being a Spellman, but being the fiercest of them all. The redhead feels proud of her niece, even if now they are even further removed from the blood, and as pride takes over her emotions, the vibrating energy of her Lily’s (Of Lilith, she corrects her own mind) presence makes itself noticeable under her skin.</p><p>There’s this stirring of feelings that happen too, as her Lily… (No. Lilith!) Walks inside their house, owning the place as she had always done. Making Zelda doubt herself more than she usually does.  A moment happens as they move from the kitchen to the living room.</p><p>Being uncomfortable under stares and remain collected is one of Lilith’s greatest and most practiced skills. Yet, the way Zelda looks at her makes her shift in her seat. The demoness also wonders why they are all waiting on a child to decide if they are going through with her plans or not. The most painful thing is the way Zelda is so close and yet so far away. It reminds her of that first day as she walked down the stairs of the mortuary and used that silly word that she knows still creates havoc on Zelda’s mind.</p><p>They continue with the plan, and it surprises the eldest Spellman the feeling of the rage boiling underneath her skin the moment tables turn and Lucifer keeps the knife pointed to them. Lilith’s rage is almost blinding, making Zelda struggle to keep in place. It’s not quite surprising that their plan fails, however. The redhead holds a smirk when Lucifer does reveal he can be killed.</p><p>As they return to the mortuary, the oldest Spellmans make their way to the living room while Lilith follows Sabrina quietly to her room. In the living room, Zelda smokes almost brazenly. Her mind racing with the day’s events, her feelings fighting her thoughts, her heart fighting her mind. Lily, her Lily, is the Dark Lord’s Lilith… The same male being who wants her child niece to rule by his side and keep her love as a maiden for him to play with.</p><p>Zelda understands better now, though. As the things that took her by surprise before falling into place as pieces of a puzzle, she didn’t know she was making. Like Lily’s majestic wielding of healing magic. The understanding eyes whenever she was broken by Faustus. The shared bond told her of a very abused being and the redhead raged. How could they worship such a nasty being? What for? Some longer days and powers she wielded rarely?</p><p>She raged against whoever had thrown her on the Spellman’s steps to be raised as a Satanist. Forced to choose between an unknown life, far away from everything she knew, and excommunicated from a church that later on, feared her.  The same church that had haunted her and finally found her alone, whose best warlocks had bounded her, weakening her, robbed her from one rib. Male members of the church had burned her at the stake while they kept her powers bound, leaving her unable to help herself.  Zelda raged against the Dark Lord, the God that wasn’t one. The one who never had heard any of her prayers, which left her wonder, had the woman pacing upstairs in Sabrina’s room ever heard any of her most devout prayers to her? Did they even hear their prayers at all?</p><p>It’s Prudence’s cries what brings her out of the meditative stance, as they move to save what remains of the Church of Night.</p><p>Sabrina comes down, followed by her friends, to find the chaos growing in the living room. Where witches lay spread around in hopes to be healed, while they piled corpses near the stairs to the mortuary. “What the heavens happened here?” Sabrina asks, bewildered. A quick explanation is given just as Zelda teleports herself back with two more witches in tow. “These two are alive. Only corpses remain, and I fear our Cain pit won’t be enough. Besides, who are we to choose who survives and who doesn’t?” Zelda says, pressing her forehead with the back of her hand. “Oh, Sabrina. Where’s?” she questions, looking over the girl’s shoulders and feeling disappointed when there’s no demoness behind her niece.</p><p>“She went back to the Academy to arrange things for my coronation,” Sabrina says flinching when she looks around and notices there are more bodies than recovering witches. Zelda recognizes this, placing a reassuring hand over her shoulders. “Don’t worry, Sabrina. At least this crisis is not your fault. We all have figured out that Faustus isn’t quite sane by now.”</p><p>“You married him, Auntie Zee,” she smiles and the mortals frown in confusion. Surprising Sabrina’s mortal friends, Zelda chuckles lightly. “Don’t remind me of stupid choices, niece. There are far more important things at hand now.”</p><p>“Speaking of which, you think we will be enough for a full casting circle?” Sabrina smiles mischievously. “Ambrose, Hilda,” Zelda calls over her shoulder. They move their conversation to the kitchen. That at least seems a bit less crowded and less grieving.</p><p>Zelda wants to chuckle when the mortals offer to help, yet the strength is in the numbers and Aradia had, for millennia, taught mortals how to access their magic. They know about Rosalind’s cunning, and they know all about Theo’s Aunt. “Lovely lady, she was,” Hilda adds as Zelda explains this.</p><p>They follow Sabrina’s plan. Ambrose and Zelda chip in too, to add some more layers over it. It doesn’t quite work. Lilith displays most of her power to keep Lucifer restrained, Zelda’s magic rises to help her without prompt on the redhead’s part. Lucifer is surprised by the force his handmaiden can wield, but he doesn’t have enough time to analyze it. The Acheron is now Sabrina’s boyfriend, and Zelda knows by the glint in her niece’s eyes that she doesn’t plan to let it like that for long.</p><p>After the witching hour, they walk to the mines, still in their fancy clothes, and it’s just then when Zelda notices it’s not only Sabrina’s boyfriend who will be gone… Each step they take is one closer to losing Her Lily. No matter how she doesn’t feel deserving of the Queen of Hell’s love, she still loves her the same.</p><p>It’s almost too obvious how they fall in pace, their hands barely touching as they walk. When Zelda trips, it’s Lilith’s hand, the one that catches her and helps the redhead to stand tall. The thrill that runs down her spine when that happens has Zelda biting back a moan. Now, the sadness she gets, it’s almost as strong as the love that vibrates under her skin. Then their eyes collide with each other. “Zelda? Do you remember that word?” She whispers.</p><p>“Mamihlapinatapai,” Zelda says.</p><p>“I should’ve never said that, and I should’ve never got past it either.” Lilith whispers, it’s almost an apology. “I still don’t know what it means,” the redhead whispers back.</p><p>“It means you were right, we are always leaving.” She adds even lower, and Zelda bites her lower lip and a tear escape her eyes. For the first time since she’s shed the first tear in front of the brunette, there’s no thumb cleaning it away. There’s no soft kiss calming her down and comforting her.</p><p>Instead, there’s silence and elaborated breathing coming from the harem of people that came to see them go. It’s the guilt and the look Zelda gives her that prompts her to return her powers to the child. The balance is still broken, yet at least the teen isn’t a mortal anymore.</p><p>“I love you,” Zelda mouths unable to help herself when Lilith looks at her, and she gets the most beautiful of the teary smiles in return. Yet, they are once again ready to let the other go. The doors close behind Lilith, however, their bond still thrums underneath Zelda’s skin.</p><p>As she lies in bed that night, after self-proclaiming herself the High Priestess of the Church of Lilith, and Directrix of the Academy, her mind wanders to the demoness, wondering if now that she has the crown she does feel fulfilled. Because if Zelda was honest… even with the titles in her hand, she only feels an awful… void.</p>
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<a name="section0033"><h2>33. Chapter 33</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm so sorry... I was struggling to find the time to fix it, so I had to do it one paragraph at the time... Enjoy it!.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Hell is, by definition, a spiritual realm of evil and suffering, and although she’d done both in here herself, Lilith sees it differently. It was, after all, the place where she had lived the longest part of her seemingly never-ending life.</p><p>Despite how everything else had changed in the many millennia of existence of the mortal realm, Hell remained stable. From the moment Lucifer’s castle was built in the city of Pandemonium, and they divided lands between the Aristocracy of Hell, way before mortals even shaped time, little in Hell has changed. Demons, no matter their rank, are very constant and immutable by nature. They like to create havoc and they love their mischiefs… but they abhor change for themselves. They do what they do, and expect that, in return, Hell remains immutable as it always was, as a layer of comfort for already chaotic beings.</p><p>That change in Hell comes to them from Lilith’s hand -of all the beings of this realm- it’s even more unnerving for them. They know Lucifer; they know how he rules, and they know where their own limits lie around him.</p><p>Now, Lilith…. The mother of demons was always the most unpredictable of them all. She was always raising chaos among their ranks, yet they feared her analytical and strategical mind. The way she was always the first in line; whenever wars were in place was inspiring. However, the highest-ranking demons always mocked and downplayed her for being just Satan’s concubine, never honored with a place of her own. Hell is a misogynous place too. And since their Lord used and abused her, they never really considered her more than His whore.</p><p>The demoness struggles with making them recognize her as their Queen. She knows Hell’s laws and structure better than anyone, so it’s easy for her to push and shove them away with them. The hordes, loyal to her, protect her fiercely against the revolts that occur every now and then. The Princes of Hell are too cowardly to confront her in battle, but they don’t doubt to pester her in council.</p><p>Even when she’s fighting them to keep control of her reign, the demoness struggles with the feelings she doesn’t want to acknowledge. With the weakness that is capable to bring her to her knees. To the pain that bubbles in her heart, simply because she misses Zelda Spellman. -At least, she knows the feeling is mutual.-</p><p>The other thing she does in the almost not-existing free-time of her schedule is reading the damned codex prognostica. Wondering why on Heavens there are entries she hasn’t read before in the copy that used to belong to the Academy of Unseen Arts. Entries including the one Nicholas Scratch mentioned, and Lucifer mocked her for not knowing. That was the comment where she had finally cut their tongue off.</p><p>As the young warlock had mentioned in the woods, the silly thing it’s not complete. There are broken phrases and what might be an entire missing paragraph. It looks as if someone had spilled some liquid to prevent anyone from fully accessing this particular prophecy. Since it’s the only entry damaged in the whole damn book.</p><p>After noticing that, Lilith had searched the original tome, the one that remains inside Hell’s Gates, whose leather covering was made of pieces of the defeated angels that gave it away, a tortured word out at the time. As she forethought, some parts of it are also missing. The original tome of tomes, for some reason she doesn’t understand, is incomplete in itself. The whole entry about her it’s not existing in it.</p><p>“The equilibrium of the realms Lilîtu has broken will be justly reestablished the day the κληρονόμος Χθονία completes the rites that transform the two parts into equals,” Lilith reads once again. “The dídymes psyches, unusual unreadable text, will find each other again as the young morning star travels across the end of its… blank... cle around Helios,” she continues as if she hadn’t read this out loud dozens of times already.</p><p>Sighing at the following lines of text that are utterly illegible, the demoness continues trying to imagine what could’ve been written between the two pieces. “… bond is started that the Devil’s sword will rise to fulfill its own path. Heaven, Earth, and Inferno will be thrown out of their singularity... More missing lines... and they will know of its hierarchy. Amid the reconstruction, equal psyche must be bound, and equilibrium achieved to birth the dawn of the new era and end the chaos of the morning star. Only the perfect balance between equals can correct the distortion created and reestablish what was bro… ken, maybe?” The brunette rubs her face tiredly.</p><p>Lilith paces and comes back to read the book, racking her brain at what could be missing from it. She finds it strange that the old Latin text mixes the Romanized version of her Akkadian name, Lilîtu, with Greek words that seem to be thrown randomly in the mix. κληρονόμος Χθονία she knows means heir of the earth. As the warlock had pointed, and as he too concluded, Lilith theorizes dídymes psyches does mean twin souls or basically the newly bound bf she doesn’t have, but most likely had found in Adam Masters before he was killed, “Yes, that makes sense…” she thinks out loud.</p><p>For a month, that’s her day… Lilith paces, a lot, as she tries to figure out the missing pieces or where to find a complete version of it. She keeps demons at bay. Her realm is almost in one piece, she oversees that souls are collected, and closes new deals. At the end of the day, she’s exhausted and when she finally collapses on her bed, every two or three days, she stays awake for hours thinking about Zelda, as if the redhead witch is not in her head or under her skin every moment of her day.</p><p>One night, she has this stupid idea that Zelda will pray to her and she will hear her, or that the eldest Spellman will summon her even if it is for explanations. The demoness wonders if the redhead would hear her if she’s the one praying to her. It does not surprise Lilith when she submits to this last desire and gets to her knees calling for the redhead’s support, and nothing happens in return. No one ever had answered her prays, and when you don’t really have that many people to pray to, things can be very lonely in moments of despair.</p><p>In the mortal realm, things weren’t so different for the redhead. The house was filled to the brim with recovering witches and corpses to be disposed of. The few lucky ones that came from families outside the Church of Night returned home to their parents. Still, a little over a dozen of witches remained, all orphaned by Faustus’ Blackwood.</p><p>Zelda’s mothering side was struggling with the situation. She was walking a very thin line between showing her always stern side, to keep things running smoothly, and coddle them with love. The thing that stopped her was Hilda. They had Hilda to look upon them, and their age range was wide enough.</p><p>Despite their young features, the redhead needed to remind herself that some of them were already somewhere above seventy years old, and the one that really needed her -her newly witch-made niece- was pushing her aside. Hiding in her room, mourning her lost beau, looking at them as if they had no clue as to what she was feeling. As if they never had loved and lost anyone before. As if Lilith hadn’t walked away from her that same night.</p><p>Days passed swiftly, mixing one after another. The feelings running underneath her skin never diminishing. She felt Lilith’s pain, sorrow, worries, and had tried summoning her to no avail. She’d prayed to the demoness as she had stopped decades ago, on her knees, hoping for an answer, yet unsurprisingly nothing came.  She could feel Hilda’s eyes on her, curious to be on to what she was keeping buried inside. Her little sister even coming to the point of offering to get back to their room, under the pretense it wouldn’t look bad since they were having space issues, but Zelda had declined.</p><p>She had been vulnerable before, and at this point in her life, the redhead couldn’t allow herself to be vulnerable again. Not until the unbalance was settled and allowed her to breathe deeply as she once could. Before Sabrina’s rebirth. Before she knew of Lilith…. When they were so utterly oblivious to the enslaving plans of their Dark Lord.</p><p>As she once had advised to Sabrina, Zelda takes one day at a time, hoping that she feels a little less pained the next day. Hating herself when not even her own advice works, the pain never weakens. She doesn’t stop missing her Lily.</p><p>Every morning Sabrina walked to the Hell’s Gates and tested new spells to open the doors. Every night, Zelda did the same with older incantations her niece wouldn’t even know how to pronounce properly. None of them were successful.</p><p>As the star-crossed lovers, they seem to be, Zelda’s trips to the Hell’s Gates had caused her to miss Lilith’s few attempts to astral projecting into the witch’s room. Hoping to find her there reading or laying on her bed yet finding the bed untouched and the redhead missing. Until it was frustratingly clear to the demoness that Zelda wanted nothing more with her. What was there for her love to have, anyway? A trip to Hell every once in a while, whenever they needed to be together? Besides, Lilith was privy to the knowledge that they needed to be together every single waking time since it was proved to her that there was no way she could’ve ever get enough of Zelda.</p><p>In the nights before retiring for ‘bed’, Zelda paced the house. Checking that all her new charges were doing all right, burying herself in old tomes, thinking how to reconstruct what was broken beyond repair. Pretending to help Sabrina to find a way to free Nicholas, yet searching for her own freedom and redemption. Sometimes, she just stared at the book in her hands unseeingly and thought about her brunette. Her Lily’s soft ways, the loving eyes, and the treasured moments they stole to their days. Memories that were trapped in her mind’s eye and replayed until she wanted nothing more to shout and cry. The latter, she usually ended up doing after returning from the mines, proving to be a failure again. She would cry under the shower, then collapse into bed, searching for a few hours of rest that wouldn’t come.</p><p>On the eve of the first month of living like this, Zelda Spellman decided she couldn’t keep going like that. Not when every single moment made her more vulnerable to her feelings. When everything turned around the fact that Nicholas Scratch was in Hell, that there was no Satan, no Church, no High Priest, no Director. Yes, she had announced, albeit to her family, that she would take upon the last too, however she hadn’t announced it to the coven.</p><p>The next morning, stern words let out that she would reopen the Academy and they started to move there. The redhead thought they needed to concentrate on something else, find a way to work around with the cards that had been dealt with them, and move on. Surely, Lilith would present herself if she wanted to talk to her. Or disagreed with her choice, right?</p><p>Zelda, though, wanted nothing more than to find her, to hold on to her Lily and forget all the wrongdoings on their collapsed worlds. Yet, she battled her mind. Knowing that it wasn’t just her Lily. Many others around the world loved and adored Lilith, and was the most heart-wrenching part of it all. Little the redhead knew about how different their thing really was for the demoness.</p><p>Then Zelda finally couldn’t take the lies anymore. That night, she used their nightly routine and prayed to Lilith. What the Directrix didn’t know, was that this was not only the first time Lilith heard an entire coven praying to her but also the first time she heard Zelda.</p><p>Lilith’s heart almost burst inside her chest at hearing her beloved’s voice. She was about to forget everything about Hell and Sabrina Morningstar, and teleport wherever the heavens the voice was when the minion announced the annoying teen's arrival.</p><p>Taking a deep breath to collect herself, she walked down the stairs. Lilith needed to convince the girl to crown her again and wouldn’t do well to present herself with shaky legs and a needy voice. Thankfully, the leverage she'd had doubled as they found Jesse Putnam’s tortured soul along the way.</p><p>Calling the infernal court, she sat on the throne and heard them spat all the things she already heard a millionth of times from their misogynist's mouths. One thing caught her attention, “the realms are in chaos, and the Earth, the Pit, the Heavens, the Cosmos, they all reject Lilith’s claim to the throne.” Annoying Beelzebub let out. He was right, the realms were in chaos. Yet, it had nothing to do with Lilith’s claim to the throne or Lucifer’s absence at all, but with the incomplete prophecy, she kept trying to understand.</p><p>Even before she’d summoned the court, the feeling at the pit on her stomach told her this was wrong. Utterly wrong. It’s not surprising to her when the entitled child betrays her, claiming the throne for herself, to restore the ‘balance of Hell’ as if she wasn’t the destabilizing force that Lilith had to learn how to balance again. At least, the demoness has some power left by being called her regent, but she knows things will be even more complex now.</p><p>Despite being around the mortal realm a lot to help Sabrina with her new duties, Lilith keeps herself out of the Academy and unknowingly away from the Aunt she wants to see. The Regent of Hell knows that’s where the teen has placed her master. What she doesn’t know is that’s the same place where Zelda is.</p><p>Days go by in the same slow motion, and the mother of demons finds herself more annoyed with the child than before. Wanting to change Hell’s inner workings and not wanting to put any work onto it, getting stuck in ice trucks because as every entitled child, Sabrina acts before, she thinks.</p><p>It’s the night when the child stupidly cannot bring Herod’s crown when she had it when Lilith decides she’s had enough. She needs a break from the Spellman child. The Unholy Regalia has been lost for millennia, yet Ambrose Spellman helped the teen-witch to find it in days. And what for? So, the stupid child could lose it, hoping a Prince of Hell will help them not to get killed?</p><p>The Regent of Hell is beyond exhausted and begins to understand the reason Zelda had asked her to stay away from her niece. That child was trouble even if she didn’t try, a Morningstar trait most likely.  </p><p>In desperate need of comfort -both hers and Zelda’s- Lilith takes a step forward to enter her chambers and finds that her mind has transported her to the Spellman Mortuary. The lights are off, and the house is eerily silent and abandoned. The demoness walks inside its walls, almost a reminiscence of the first time she was there, and smiles softly at the feeling it brings.</p><p>On the other end of their bond, these feelings bubble underneath the redhead’s skin, who is hiding under books to try not to think about what she’s missing. About what she’s never had before her Lily. About Hilda’s claims of her loveless life and Sabrina’s hurtful words, whenever she tries to console her.</p><p>Lilith feels the relaxing vibe from her disappeared love and smiles as she trails her hand over the rails of the stairs. It won’t be long, she hopes, until things are stable enough in hell to be able to track her beloved and finally seat to have that talk, as they should have. The prophecy about a male soul mate be damned.</p><p>Finding the door she knows belongs to the eldest Spellman’s room, the demoness opens it and lets herself inside Zelda’s room, closing the door behind her. The last thing she needs is for someone finding her there. After making sure there’s no one inside (there’s no humming underneath her skin, so sadly there’s most definitively no Zelda), Lilith drops herself in the bed and hugs the pillow close. It still smells like her Zelda, albeit faintly.  Embracing it as if it was the redhead herself, the demoness buries herself into it and surprisingly falls asleep, finally feeling at home. </p>
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<a name="section0034"><h2>34. Chapter 34</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Zelda works. Day in and night out. Some days, morning comes before she even found the will to get to the room she shares with Hilda at the Academy. The directrix is tired of watching her sister’s eyes stuck in her as if trying to will her to share with her the feelings she can’t begin to unravel for herself. She’s done with trying to lift Sabrina’s spirits, only to be on the end of the teen’s derision, mocked for her own so-called loveless life. “<em>How would you know, Zelda, what I feel if the only thing you ever cared and lost was my father?</em>” The teen had spat at her the last time she tried.</p><p>Instead of getting depressed by the teenager’s hurtful words, Zelda had turned her energies into getting the Academy back on track and destroying the fake idol statue. There’s no way she can begin to explain how good it had felt to beat down the statue that replaced the one of their former God. How much pleasure it had brought to her to kill this part of Blackwood’s legacy with her own hands. Days later, seeing the cleared space still brings her joy. Just like remembering how she couldn’t help but flinch and feel the fear that almost brought her to her knees when Hilda appeared behind her with Faustus’s glamor made her feel ashamed. When not even her little sister’s bubbliness could help the way her heart kept racing until Hilda appeared as herself again. How that entire experience had left her frayed.</p><p>She also had spent some hours racking her head and reading to figure out if the loss of potency the High Priests of the other covens claimed to be feeling is really related to the fact that there was no Lucifer on Hell’s throne. However, her coven already had days praying to Lilith and the failing magic had remained. The High Priestess had suspected that this fluctuation in the powers that everyone is worrying about might be related to the way the equilibrium was still thrown off. The redhead can still feel the entire extent of her own magic, yet she can also feel the constant shift of energies that make her own powers conflictive, to say the least.</p><p>It's the days with Lucifer mocking them with his devil tricks that tires her the most. When even bound by Damascus steel, thrown on an ill-prepared witch cell, and surrounded by a circle of salt that was broken (most likely by the same girl who made it) Lucifer can control them all by his will.</p><p>It’s a step backward to know the leash is still short, and yet, it’s the impulse the Directrix needs too, to hate the fallen Angel -now also fallen God- that reminds her too much of her husband. Then, she gets to take pride in being the one transferring Lucifer’s soul into Faustus’ as painfully as she can. As if she’s avenging every misdeed done by man to any woman who dared to be better than them. It’s barely enough, she reckons, but at least it is a step.</p><p>The fights with Hilda, though, aren’t as great for her spirit. They start when her little sister sides with Sabrina after they confronted her about going to Hell to retrieve Mr. Scratch. Yes, the kid was heartbroken, and Nicholas Sparks had sacrificed himself to stop her father. However, empathy aside, Zelda considered their niece had escaped the consequences of her actions for far too long. She had put, after all, more people in danger just to follow blindly whatever brilliant new idea was brewing in her mind. Dragging her mortal friends to a realm that could’ve killed them just by trespassing it and coming out of her ‘adventure’ unscathed. As if being Lucifer’s spawn gave her some escape from jail card that allowed her to do as she pleased and then consequences wouldn’t come to her.</p><p>Yet, when Zelda was almost stomping her feet on the ground to make her point across, Hilda had sided with the child, and this fantastic synchronicity that seemed attached to her niece had happened again. Prudence and Ambrose showed up with Blackwood in tow. After that event, discussions with Hilda happen almost hourly. They had started right at breakfast the next morning.  When she was chastising Sabrina, and her sister adds a comment about it. Zelda also noticed the funny expressions her sister made when talking with the youngsters before Sabrina and Nick left towards Baxter High.</p><p>It hadn’t helped her mood that she also had felt Lilith near that same morning. Yet, when the redhead stood up to follow the energy of her nearness, there was no one out there. No Nicholas, No Sabrina… Most definitively, no Lilith. The directrix hadn’t even felt the demoness’ energy anymore, which left her to contemplate what the heavens had been the Queen of Hell doing at their yard? And why hadn’t she gotten inside the house?</p><p>“Perhaps, she came to check how the unbalance of energies is affecting us?” Zelda reflected as she sneezed again. She knew all the sneezing couldn’t be a good omen. She had never been sick before, so decidedly she blamed it on the lack of equilibrium of powers. And as the other covens claim to have felt a loss of potency, her already little coven loses another member to an attempt on flying. The Directrix hopes they can overcome what the unbalance is creating, but she has doubts. More of them appear -over herself and her own personality- as she finds the coven reading Hilda’s book hours later.</p><p>Yes, she had killed Hilda several times. Whenever she’ had been beyond angry, always making her best to bring her back from the dead afterward. However, not even in the time of her harrowing had she humiliated the blonde witch in public. Even less in the way she did to her. The betrayal of reading this fiction based on their reality breaks the redhead inside.</p><p>Of course, she hadn’t approved Dr. Cee when she had met him. He was a lunatic mortal man, always wearing a ridiculous costume and living a life of fiction. Sure, the redhead had thought that by working in his store Hilda was only wasting her time, especially when she was so very good at spell and potions. Yet, Zelda had supported their relationship once she noticed how much Hilda cared. For hell’s sake, she had given her a pep-talk and even tips on how to keep his incubus contained so they could enjoy themselves!</p><p><em>‘Being terrorized by the witch’s loveless spinster hag of a sister,’</em> is not exactly how she would describe her behavior with them. Or how she would describe herself for that matter, and it breaks her heart that Hilda thinks of her like that.  Words published in a book when no one would know it’s them, she can take. Now, the way Hilda looks at her and tells her, “write what you know, it’s not what they say?” really affects her, hurting her already frayed self-esteem. Hilda’s words are, after all, a confirmation that her little sister sees her like a loveless spinster hag, and how could she know any different if that’s the woman Zelda has been portraying for centuries to protect her too?</p><p>To stop herself from falling apart right in the middle of a room full of witches, the Directrix straightens, walls building fast and thick as she takes her little sister to the side. “You are Spellman, you have a duty…” She starts. Of course, the redhead understands the Academy, it’s not Hilda’s call. Yet, the two of them are the only centuries-old adults that remain nearby, so even if they weren’t bound by the Spellman name, how could they not try to help the young ones that remain under the Academy’s care?</p><p>“I have a duty to myself to be happy,” Hilda explains then, only to add more woods to the fire that’s already raging inside her older sister. The blonde knows she is making Zelda angry. She simply doesn’t care now. It’s her time to do so. Her older sister won’t kill her now when there’s the uncertainty of their pit working. Yet, Zelda surprises her when she deletes every single word she wrote in that book. The redhead won’t tell her sister that she only destroyed the copies at the Academy. Because even if she’s pained by the words, and by the truth as Hilda sees it, she wants her little sister to thrive, even if it’s as a purveyor of lurid fiction. As long as no one can place them and as the characters of the book.</p><p>At least Prudence had taken over the Prefect of Students’ offer. And that leaves the redhead alone for the night.</p><p>With Prudence there, there is no genuine need for Zelda to remain at the academy for the night anymore.  Going home, though, hadn’t felt this distressing, not since back at the old days, when she would’ve come ‘home’ to see things unchanged. Where violence -a cold shoulder, bitter words, and just the plain disgust at having her back- was the coin they gave her every minute the redhead remained inside the Mortuary walls. Unless there was Ambrose visiting and Zelda kept them both locked at the library. The Spellman family pariahs.</p><p>Now, knowing she would have the house for herself really had brought no joy. Zelda decided that perhaps it was time for her to take her definitive leave from that place. To allow Hilda to keep it, her little sister had someone to share it with and it was what her birthright would’ve given her hadn’t someone left Zelda into their lives. Besides, willing to accept it or not, Sabrina was becoming a young adult who always had shown preference to ask for anyone’s aid but hers. Hilda was always a better shoulder for the teen, and what use they would have for a loveless spinster anymore? When Hilda had her Dr. Cee, Ambrose his prudence, and Sabrina her Nick… and Zelda... she was left to the emptiness of waiting for a being that might forever remain ruling Hell, never to cross the mortal realm again.</p><p>Directrix Spellman had all but forgotten to eat supper, as she was still finding new ways to bury herself under the pile of work she had created for herself. If only to stop the dreadful thoughts that were growing freely in her mind. Roaming like an electric current under her skin, making her vulnerable. Pushing her near her breaking point.</p><p>It’s the hunger that finally distracts her from dark thoughts. There’s a bitter jab when she remembers Hilda’s ‘<em>so you cook your own dinner,’</em> as she makes herself a sandwich with the dinner’s leftovers. Zelda’s depressive thoughts take quickly half of her appetite away. Leaving half of it not eaten as she continues pondering and beating herself for things, she has no control of.</p><p>Sparing a glance at the half-filled plate, the redhead sighs. Throwing food away had always reminded her of those vagrant kids she had given fruits and had huddled up to eat it every time she had a chance on her long existence. It brought forth the knowledge of how their struggle was worse than hers. There’s nothing else to do, though. She shrugs as she throws the food away and cleans her plate.</p><p>After checking the rooms and closing her office for the night, Zelda finds her way to her room at the academy and gets ready for a night of solitude. Something she hadn’t for days, since Hilda was sharing this gigantic bed with her.</p><p>Tossing and turning, unable to find any comfort in a bed that wasn’t hers and felt too big on her frame, she stood up. She paced the room and as she did, her eyes fell on her reflection.</p><p>Since learning who her Lily was, and then losing her to Hell with no chance to discuss whatever arrangements one could reach with someone as powerful and looked upon like the demoness, Zelda had worn a glamor after another to keep her true state from showing up. Blaming her foul mood to Blackwood, to the academy, to Sabrina or Hilda’s antics, or to the job she took upon itself. Just never to the broken heart that no one else knew she carried along.</p><p>Being utterly alone, there was no need to keep the glamor up. She painted the perfect image of brokenness. Her eyes filled with unshed tears of devastating pain, shining shallowly. Deep black circles surrounding them, making her look paler and sicker than she could look.</p><p>The emptiness she noticed in her eyes reminded her of the days under the Caligari spell. Yet, back then, it was a magic trick, now... This was all that remained of her. Alone and empty. A carcass of who she once was. Once again abandoned by everyone as she had been since the beginning. A tear left her eye and her nose became stuffy as she fought to keep dreadful feelings inside. She was falling into the abyss and, just like her entire life, there was only herself to catch her.</p><p>Huffing angrily at her own status, Zelda transports herself to the mortuary. Dreaded feelings or not, her bed was safe and would at least get her through some hours of much-needed rest. The Directrix isn’t ready for the bursting energy that takes over her like a gust of fresh, cold wind. ‘It couldn’t be,’ she thinks.</p><p>Yet, there she was, the Queen of Hell cuddling up to her pillow on Zelda’s bed. Tight dress riding up white creamy thigh that was thrown across the pillow. Brown mane covering her face, yet the redhead didn’t need to see her face to know who she was. The High Priestess’s heart melts at the sight.</p><p>And like a moth to a flame, the eldest Spellman pads to her own bed and drops beside her love. Lilith stirs a little at the sudden weight change, but feeling the comforting humming of Zelda’s nearness, she simply shuffles closer to the warmth that had placed itself behind her back. The demoness moans in delight at the feeling that takes over her body, sending shivers all across it.</p><p>Unable to stop herself, the redhead places a soft kiss on her shoulder and brings her close, burrowing herself in the crook of the brunette’s neck and the warm feeling of home that invades her fully. All previous thoughts about abandonment and unworthiness are forgotten just by the way her Lily melds into her. With the brunette finally safe in her arms, Zelda feels utterly complete.</p><p>“Sleep, love, it’s just me,” the redhead whispers, and the demoness twists in her arms until she is facing her. A pale freckled hand raises to move amber strands away from the beloved face she had missed so much and gets lost for a second in the green pools that look at her in the same way she always had.</p><p>“It could never be <em>just</em> you, Zelda. Don’t you know that?”  Lilith whispers in awe to this woman who cares for her in ways the demoness never thought possible. The youngest witch blushes under the attention and suckles her lower lip. There were so many things she wanted to ask her before. So many questions had consumed her every waking hour since the brunette’s secret was let out. Yet, none comes out now when she finally has her close. “I’ve missed you, love,” Lilith says and pecks the redhead’s lips. Any coherent thought completely abandons Zelda’s mind then. “I’ve missed you too,” she answers, kissing her Lily deeply.</p><p>Mouths move, dancing slowly against each other. Tongues caress as they were granted entrance and their bodies collide one against the other. Soft mounds pressing tightly, legs tangling messily, and no matter how unbalanced everything else seemed to be, they felt perfectly in tune. They felt like coming home after a storm. </p><p>Breaking their kiss, they both sigh, resting foreheads against each other. “I’m exhausted, darling, do you mind if…” the demoness trails off, caressing Zelda’s cheek. Blushing furiously, totally embarrassed of needing to sleep now, when she finally crossed over to this realm and they could do far more.</p><p>“If we just sleep?” Zelda finishes. Feeling the comfort of shared memories from the first weeks of their relationship, and the exhaustion that comes from the woman that’s lying in front of her. “Of course, love. I would never pressure you…” she agrees, placing a strand of hair away from her face. “I love you… and Lilith...”</p><p>“Just Lily…” the demoness says searching green eyes, “for you, my sweetness, I’m just Lily.”  Zelda kisses her for that, and the Regent of Hell chuckles happily at it. “You were saying?” she wonders then.</p><p>“Don’t be embarrassed, Lily, I’m exhausted too…” Zelda confesses. The mother of demons’ eyes fills with understanding, as she caresses soft cheeks. They move at once to tangle themselves comfortably, not before hands are waved and clothes disappear away from them. Sleep takes over them quickly and swiftly, the feeling of safety and the love they share creating a cocoon that makes them forget of anything else but the perfect feeling of the other in their arms.</p>
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<a name="section0035"><h2>35. Chapter 35</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm trying to beat the release of the new season, (for some reason I think we won't see much of Madam Spellman) but I guess life has other plans for me since I've barely had time to sit and write.<br/>Anyhow, this is a fluffy fluff... I think. Enjoy it and let me know what you think! :D</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It was hours past the witching hour when the High Priestess had found her way to the Spellman mortuary, and by the extension, to the surprise of finding the sleeping demoness cuddling up to her pillow.</p><p>As per usual when they found each other to sleep, the astral realm claimed their souls for a journey they knew nothing about, and yet was filled with happiness and the love they were so afraid to expose to everyone else to see. Floating in the feelings, they struggled with every waking hour and scares them as much as comforts them.</p><p>And just like whenever they had found themselves exhausted in each other’s arms; time flew out of the window. They were left in their own little healing skin-to-skin cocooning comfort of tangled legs, tight embraces, shared breathes, and manes covering their faces and the pillowcases creating an amber and chocolate halo that looked like dawn over the dark sheets.</p><p>However, time was always unrelenting, and it’s two hours before noon when the always punctual Directrix is still nowhere to be found inside the Academy she runs with machinery precision; while she remains utterly oblivious to the search for her that has started. That’s how Hilda found Zelda cuddled up to a brunette she knew nothing about as if the woman was the most comfortable teddy bear in the world.</p><p>The Spellmans and the students had been searching for Zelda for a little over an hour now. They had visited every room at the academy (including the dungeons), the academy’s library was swept clean, and yet, there was not a sign of the stern High Priestess.</p><p>Hilda, who had spent the night at Dr. Cee’s after his proposal, had questioned Sabrina to see if she had seen or felt her eldest aunt back home. Yet, the exhausted teen had transported herself straight to her bathroom after getting back from Hell and was fast asleep even before her regent had thought (or not at all) about getting herself to the almost empty mortuary.</p><p>Thinking that it was just like Zelda to disappear when they needed her, Hilda transported herself back home, hoping that as per usual her older sister had left behind at least a clue as to where she was going. However, the moment the blonde entered the house she could identify the existence of a magical being inside the mortuary’s walls. Although she could feel the magic and easily know which members of her family were nearby by the distinct traits of their powers, Hilda was never as exceptional at it as Zelda always had been.</p><p>What she could assure at that point, if anyone asked her, was that, just as Sabrina said, her sister wasn’t home. However, the teen had failed to mention someone else was, or maybe had been, inside since magic traces were faint. So, she followed the remaining traces to… Zelda’s room. Frowning and not quite thinking about what she could or couldn’t have found inside, Hilda opened the door rather abruptly, to catch whoever dared to enter there and violate her sister’s privacy.</p><p>The last thing in Hilda’s mind was that she would find her sister so peacefully asleep. Let alone in someone’s arms. ‘Definitively naked,’ the blonde thought as she noticed there was too much skin on display on both sides of the bed. However, the relief that flooded the blonde had quickly become a scare. </p><p>What Hilda sees is a toned creamy body, that is still a shade or two darker than Zelda’s -Not that it’s difficult for anyone to be a shade, or three hundred, darker than her older sister-, but the blonde knows exactly how they contrast; because, if anything, Hildegard Spellman has functioning eyes and can see her sister’s hand comfortably placed over the pretty not covered ass she’s left to see. Or in how their legs are tangled and it’s obvious to her which limbs belong to her usually stern sister. By the way breasts press together, the younger sister knows they are facing each other even if she can’t quite see either face. The mysterious brunette has hers covered by her own mane that mixes nicely with the red of Zelda’s while the older sister has her face hidden … somewhere … All the younger witch knows is they are enthralling and magnetic as they lie together as if they were a hyper-realistic painting that needed to be preserved and showcased.</p><p>Returning from the astral plane where they ended up, the first thing Zelda noticed was the third magic entering their privacy. Raising her hand, a protection spell quickly arose between them and whoever had entered their sacred space. Unknowingly forcing her sister to take a couple of steps away from the inner side of the threshold.</p><p>Even if in her half-asleep state, the redhead recognizes the bubbly energy that joined them in the room, although she can’t quite pinpoint to who it belongs, yet. Moving her head from where it was safely tucked on Lilith’s neck. Zelda raises it barely above the brunette’s body, only enough to glare at the person who had dared to disturb them and then burn whoever it was to ashes. Frowning, she recognizes the figure who is currently kept away from the room, being held in place by her magic and spell. </p><p>“Hilda?” she asks. Lowering her hand along the protective barrier she’d cast to rub the sleep out of her eyes. Noticing quickly that the way they are laying on the bed keeps her little sister from knowing who the goddess in her bed is. Even if she most likely had a wonderful sight of her Lily’s derriere. “Zelds, I… Will you two want some breakfast?” the blonde stutters out, too shocked by the image she found. To be honest, it’s not that she thought Zelda had become celibate in the years since she returned to the Spellman mortuary. Not when her older sister was always so open about her brazen sexuality since her youth. Even when Hilda had heard witches and warlocks talk about Zelda’s bed skills when they were younger, she never had found her sister in such a compromising position before.</p><p>“Don’t worry, sister, I can arrange it myself,” Zelda adds hastily, as Lilith stirs beside her, pressing herself further into the redhead while keeping her face hidden under the cover of her hair. The redhead’s hand presses the demoness further into her body, to let her know she was safe. “Oh... okay… I-I... I’ll head back to the Academy then... You should… hm... take the day off, perhaps? I’m glad you are okay... Zelds,” Hilda lets out before she closes the door.</p><p>Zelda lets herself fall against the pillow and sighs in relief, chuckling lightly afterward. “I don’t think she knows who you are, Lily,” she says, clearing the hair from Lilith’s face and kissing her. “I don’t think she thought we only slept, though,” the redhead adds as they break the kiss, making Lilith giggle with the comment. “Hilda’s energy was rather anxious…” the demoness whispers. “Was she always so shy about sexuality?”</p><p>“Too timid for her own good. Yet, to be honest, love, I would be anxious too. If I opened the door and was presented with such an ample knowledge of how perfect your derriere looks when naked, my darling,” Zelda grins mischievously, her hand traveling down and pressing supple flesh to make her point. Lilith squints her eyes at her as if assessing her comment. “You make an excellent point there, sweetness. It does look rather impressive if I say so myself,” the demoness jokes then. “You could’ve covered my assets, love, you know?”</p><p>“And risk uncovering your gorgeous face when we agreed to keep this between us until we were ready for more?” The High Priestess wonders. The demoness suckles her lower lip before kissing her darling once more. “Sweet Zelda, should we wonder how long we were out this time around?”</p><p>The redhead groans, “I’m sure it’s late, if I take the ‘I’m glad you are okay’ as a sign.” She raises her head again to survey her room in search of clues for how late it currently is. “It’s close to noon. They should be able to go a few more hours without you in Hell, shouldn’t they?” the Spellman witch asks, moving closer again, nuzzling Lilith’s neck, and gaining a moan in approval.</p><p>“Worst-case scenario, I’ll find a clay boy sitting on my throne.” Lilith musses. “But yeah, nothing I wouldn’t be able to undo.” Zelda gives her a sly smirk, and without warning, throws her on her back and straddles her hips. A gasp leaves the demoness, and her hands rest at the redhead’s thighs, as Lilith fights with herself. The way the woman underneath her is sending fear through their link makes Zelda stop any further movement, worrying about her.</p><p>“Lily? Love?” The High Priestess asks in concern. The regent of hell has her eyes scrunched tightly shut and her previously calm breathing comes out in elaborated puffs. Zelda wants to beat herself for her stupidity. “Oh, Heavens! I’m sorry, darling, I’m so sorry…” She says noticing she must have triggered some trauma. The redhead is about to throw herself to the side to free her from her pinning when the hands that were over her thighs move to press her down, not allowing her to move away.</p><p>Blue eyes open and greens read the fear that lingers. “It’s not your fault, my sweet Zelda,” Lilith smiles. “I trust you, and you’ve proved yourself before. In ways no one else did. I just wasn’t ready to be tackled, I suppose.” She lets out, and as if to prove her words, the feelings the Directrix get underneath her skin are opposite of the panic she felt just recently. The demoness hand travels upwards until she can pull Zelda down for a kiss.</p><p>“I believe, High Priestess, you had a rather sinful plan in that pretty head of yours?” Lilith asks playfully once she’s done with Zelda’s mouth and they both need to stop to breathe. Zelda suckles her lower lip and nods. “Then, by all means, you can expect my total cooperation,” the demoness grins, caressing a soft cheek with one hand. As if that was all she needed. The redhead launches herself forward, capturing swollen lips and then freeing them in favor of kissing and nipping at cheeks, jaw, neck, before starting a torturing path south.</p><p>Lilith’s hand claimed one of Zelda’s as the redhead reached her intended destination, while the other one entangled itself in amber threads. The directrix grins against moist folds before concentrating on getting her Lily worked up with practiced ease. The regent of hell’s moans and groans are music to the High Priestess ears, indicating her the way further into Lilith’s ecstasy. Unable to control herself any longer, the first witch let herself go, hips writhing at their own volition in search of the needed friction.</p><p>“Zelda,” she chants once, and green eyes look up from where her mouth was enjoying its feast. Blue eyes find them, and Lilith blushes at the imagery. Her Zelda, all wild hair and bright eyes latched between her legs, was more than enough to have her come. However, it wasn’t just that. It was bright eyes filled with love and the same feeling overflowing them both at once. The demoness had never crossed over the brink of ecstasy in such a powerful way. White lights shining brightly behind the forcefully closed lids and for the first time had she called a name as she came undone.</p><p>Hearing her name, the redhead looked up. Never stopping her ministrations, not even when the way her name is called again -a mix of a pant, a groan, and an awed whisper- has her body covered with goosebumps swiftly. Sending need pooling down at her core. ‘No,’ she thinks, this isn’t about her need or the feelings of unworthiness she carried around, but about her Lily, and watching her -this powerful being- coming undone so gloriously carelessly in front of her. This one wasn’t really about love, but about trust.</p><p>She doesn’t stop her work, allowing the demoness to ride her orgasm until she was back on Earth. Yet, instead of stopping then, the redhead continues with languid movements. A well-placed bite later has her Lilith coming undone once more.</p><p>Always the overachiever, Zelda aims for a third.</p><p>“Show off,” Lilith pants after the redhead completed her plan, and starts her path upwards. “I could go for fourths,” Zelda punctuates every word while kissing her way up to an awaiting mouth. The demoness rewards her with a laugh, a wholeheartedly one, and the redhead knows she hit the jackpot. It was so rare for either of them to be able to be this carefree and happy, even if only for a few hours of their long lives. “I love you,” she whispers, placing a strand of hair behind Lilith’s ears, before kissing her deeply.</p><p>As they kiss, the demoness embraces Zelda so tightly that the High Priestess wonders whose broken parts Lilith is trying to meld back together. Hers or Zelda’s own. It doesn’t matter anyway, they both had been aware of the truth since the first time their eyes collided at the Spellman Mortuary. Whenever you are as happy as they are right now, the fall is just greater. They are both just truly waiting for the other shoe to drop, both terrified of what it will mean to already shattered souls.</p><p>Instead of dwelling on it, Lilith turns the tables and pays Zelda the same attention the redhead had paid to her. Until the usual shiny whiteness of the High Priestess’ skin was replaced with a flushed red version of it, with a shininess that came from a thin layer of sweat.</p><p>“Praise Lilith,” Zelda lets out later when the demoness had decided that fourths were as good as thirds and the redhead had found it in herself the strength to remember how to move. They had come undone together, mouths trapping inside the last cry of ecstasy. Lilith laughs again at the directrix choice of words, pecking her lips. “Praised be, Zelda Phiona and her marvelous, addictive mouth,” the demoness counters.</p><p>As if they have no care in the world, they snuggle together once more. “We really should get a bath,” Zelda whispers as her hand travels up and down the still sticky skin of her love. “I think we should remember how to stand before we can even think about a bath,” Lily jokes, making her favorite redhead laugh. “Right, I’m not sure I can do that just yet,” Zelda agrees. Silence settles in the room for a moment, and their breathing evens out.</p><p>The room was darker when they opened their eyes. This time it wasn’t for so many hours, just enough to consider it a nap. “You think you can stand up now?” Lilith wonders as Zelda stretches against her. “I can try. I’m famished. We are stinky, and no matter how much I think about it, there’s no possible way for you to rule hell from my bed or I can control the academy with you here.” She says, and then, tangling her hands, she brings them up and places a kiss on the inner side of Lilith’s wrist.</p><p>“I could always try,” the demoness grins impishly, eyes shining bright with mirth. “Now, I’m not sure I could keep the court from seeing your delightful body as I have my way with you whenever I please.” She wriggles her eyebrows playfully. Getting a slap on her shoulder. “Aren’t you quite kinky?” Zelda chuckles.</p><p>“Darling, I am a demoness. You don’t get kinkier than me,” Lilith smiles proudly. Then she frowns. The redhead looks at her expression confused. Another impish smile graces the mother of demons’ features, “well, perhaps you, love. You might be kinkier than me…” she adds and gets an eye roll for her joke and finally Zelda stands up.</p><p>“Well, what can I say, you might have a point there…” She adds pecking her lips. “I’ll get the bath running, and then once we are clean. I’ll make us something to eat. I’m sure the house is empty and will remain empty until I appear at the Academy.”</p><p>“Why are you so sure about it? Usually, it seems they can’t live without you,” Lilith wonders. Zelda just shrugs, walking towards the bathroom. “To be perfectly honest, I’m sure Hilda has never seen me as she saw us today, and that most likely will have them trying to figure out what to think and how to act around me. As if having you, changes anything about who I am or how they should behave.” She throws over her shoulders as she saw the demoness following her into the adjacent room.</p><p>“Does it?” Lilith asks as she embraces the redhead from behind, icy blue eyes searching greens through their reflection in a full-body mirror.  Zelda moves her head to the side, to allow her Lily to accommodate hers on her shoulder.  “No, not for them. For me, it changes the world, Lily. You changed my world.” She states, twisting in her arms to face her. “I only hope I’m enough to change even an itty bitty part of yours.”</p><p>Freckled hands find soft cheeks and caress away the tears that fall freely. “Oh, love, you rocked mine and changed it all. You have no idea just how much I’ve needed you before. How much I’ve searched you, how much I’ve longed for you. You have no idea how lonely millennia can be when someone who cares its only a figment of your imagination you hold on to survive.”</p><p>“I don’t know how millennia feels, Lily, but I know exactly what you mean, love. I’ve been there too.” Zelda smiles tearily. “And now I must be grateful for every minute I spent hanging by a thread because it allows me to hold you and understand that side of you I’m sure no one else has seen.” She whispers, placing her forehead on Lilith’s.</p><p>“Zelda, I’m not sure what future I could offer you if any. I’m… a demon, after all. I… There’s Lucifer and there’s hell and there are prophecies and… too damn many things playing at once… Just know, no matter what happens to us, together or apart, I’ve been nothing but honest with you when it’s just the two of us.”</p><p>“I know, love. I know.” She pecks soft lips again. “Well, I guess all this sappiness allowed the tub to fill,” Lilith jokes, as water overflows the limits of the bathtub and splashes on their feet. They laugh again as they wave to clear the mess, and finally settle contentedly inside the warm, relaxing water.</p>
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<a name="section0036"><h2>36. Chapter 36</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm not so sure why I think Ambrose and Zelda are way closer than they seem.<br/>Also... I have mixed feelings about P3. :D  sorry if it shows :D</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Zelda was right, she had to go and find them at the Academy for them to confront her. She shakes her head at the predictability of her family. She won’t complain about it now, because it allowed her to enjoy such a wonderful day in ways they wouldn’t ever understand. With everything so fresh in her mind (and her skin), whatever form of inquisition will come won’t ruin what already happened. She can’t keep the smile that spreads wide as she walks towards the deeper part of the woods.</p><p>After their abrupt wake-up call, spell-casting Hilda out of the room and the awkwardness of having to get rid of her little sister while laying bare in her lover’s arms. She and Lilith had enjoyed a kinkier afternoon. A bath later, and their day became quite domestic.</p><p>They walked downstairs barefooted and dressed in nothing but Zelda’s robes to get something to eat. As many times before, they worked side by side with practiced ease -even if they hadn’t done this at the Spellman’s kitchen before- they danced perfectly around each other as they found what was needed, and sooner than anyone would’ve given Zelda credit for, they were having their meal; with lingering touches, plenty of eye contact and fluid conversation.</p><p>Despite the long list of themes each of them avoids, it wasn’t hard to find something to talk about that didn’t include Hell, religion, or Sabrina. They had long lives to perfect their conversation skills and plenty of things in common as they had found out back then when they were just Zelda and Mary.</p><p>Another hour goes by before they walk back to the room so Zelda could dress. Lilith finds it fascinating that someone as powerful as the redhead takes her time getting her skin pampered, then preparing her outfits, and finally dressing without using a hint of magic. Whereas the demoness simply waves her hand and magics herself into a dress that she knows she will change the moment she gets to hell.–It just doesn’t quite have the Regent of Hell flair- Finally, they walk through the woods and into the mines.</p><p>They kiss by Hell’s gate, hands lingering for long. Until Lilith smiles softly. “You should go,” they say at once, chuckling at it. “Well, it’s not like we haven’t had the entire afternoon to talk… however, I must ask, have you learned anything about how we could fix the unbalance?” Zelda inquires.</p><p>Lilith sighs, “there’s an incomplete prophecy… I couldn’t quite get to it, yet,” she lies. She doesn’t want to ruin this day by telling Zelda that restoring the balance would mean that they are beyond over. That either she would be replaced in the demoness life by a man Lilith hasn’t known yet, or well, the balance would never be restored since she ate Adam.</p><p>“If you send it my way, I might be able to track it,” the redhead offers. “Zelda, love, as if you have any more time than I do to track this down. You don’t need more things on your plate,” the demoness says, caressing her cheek. “Now, you should go, and so should I.” With a wave of her hand, Lilith is changed into one of her Hell gowns and opens the doors.</p><p>The Directrix watches her cross the threshold and sighs. She can’t help but feel both abandoned, and that is she’s also walking away once more. Feeling those emotions coming from her love, Lilith turns around and winks. “Always returning,” she says, a huge bright smile on her face, before the door’s close. With nothing left for her to do there, the eldest Spellman walks out of the mine and further inside the woods. Checking there’s no one around, she transports herself to the Academy’s entrance.</p><p>Squaring her shoulders, Zelda places her hand on the door and enters the Academy. Not quite ready to face her family and not sure of what she’s going to disclose.  As she feared, she finds them holed up at her office. Silence takes over the moment she opens the door and three Spellman sets of eyes turn towards her.</p><p>“Could you stop looking at me as if I just resurrected? for Hell’s sake. I take one day off, and you lot look at me as if the world is about to collapse.”</p><p>“Auntie Zee… It’s not… Aunt Hilda said she found you with someone?” Sabrina lets out and Zelda glares at her sister.</p><p>“What now? I’m going to receive some chastising barb from my niece because I have a life? Wasn’t it just yesterday where you two were mocking me for not having one? Now, the joke is on you two. No, I won’t tell you more about this. There are things far more important than what I do or don’t with my time.”</p><p>“I… We are just happy for you, Auntie Zee… If this… woman… makes you happy, I guess?” Sabrina tries to explain but fails miserably. Ambrose winks at Zelda, if only to confirm to her he won’t be getting the cat out of the bag if she doesn’t want it out. She gives him a curt nod as an answer.  “Can we not make a gigantic snowball out of a night?” Zelda rolls her eyes then.</p><p>“Do we get to meet her?” Sabrina prods. “No,” the redhead answers curtly.</p><p>“There’s one thing, Zelds…” Hilda trails. “I’m… When I got there… I could only feel faint traces of one magical being that wasn’t you. As far as I felt, you weren’t home. However… when you woke up… I could feel your magic again, and hm, hers?”</p><p>“Oh, so she is a witch!” The teen grins, making Zelda groan and plop herself elegantly on her chair. “Why are we still discussing this?” The redhead asks. “Of course, she’s a witch.”</p><p>“I couldn’t tell who she is… Haven’t we met her before?” Hilda tries, and the eldest Spellman wills her cigarette before continuing this. She lights one and takes a drag, savoring it for a moment before letting the smoke out again. “Perhaps. Are we done now?”</p><p>“No, I mean… There’s still the issue that there was only one magical signature until you guys woke up?” Hilda tries again.  Zelda looks at Ambrose, wondering if he has something to say about this. The directrix knows what it could mean, but she doesn’t want to have to explain it herself. Silences follow.</p><p>“It has to do with entering the astral realm, sister.” She says, and the trio frowns. Another couple of drags later, they are still waiting on her to add more information about it. “We left our physical bodies behind, I can only assume that the faint magic you felt was a byproduct of the traveling. Perhaps the pure connection of bodies with souls. That’s why when we woke up or returned from our travel, you felt us again.” Ambrose smiles, and that’s a sign he knows more and he isn’t disclosing it.</p><p>“Now, that this thing is absolutely done. Please tell me, what has transpired here while I was gone?”</p><p>The Spellman’s launch on an explanation of what they’ve done at the academy for the day. Until there’s nothing else to do than to join the coven for dinner and then for their nightly prayers afterward.  “Ambrose, can I have a word with you before we go?” Zelda stops him.</p><p>“Of course, Auntie Zee,” He smiles, and waits until the doors are closed behind Hilda and Sabrina to continue. “Had a great day with… Lily?” He asks, lowering his voice almost to a whisper when he calls the demoness by the name Zelda was given for her. She can’t help the smile that blossoms on her face even if she tries.</p><p>“A great one, but that’s not of your concern. Have you by any chance come across a prophecy that mentions the unbalance of the realms?” The High Priestess wonders as she moves to sit closer to him. The redhead still feels that the Academy walls have ears of their own. “I don’t recall reading one on the Codex Prognostica. It’s been years since I’ve read that tome, I know you and Nicholas were reading it before…” she waves.</p><p>Her nephew sighs, “No from the top of my head, no. However, I can check our Codex for you, Auntie.” He offers with a smile, the Directrix takes a deep breath at this. “Please, do that Ambrose, or bring me the book and I’ll check it myself. I know we are overloading you at the moment.”</p><p>“Who isn’t overloaded, nowadays?” He lets out and Zelda sighs. “Don’t worry, Auntie Zee, things will get better.”</p><p>“How can you be so sure, Ambrose? When everything seems to be crumbling further? I can barely recognize what made us who we are anymore.” She confesses. He takes his hand in hers and kisses her knuckles. “Because I can see your happiness underneath it all, Auntie. There aren’t worries or troubles that will suffice to erase that glint from your eyes. If that’s not hopeful… then we are all doomed.”</p><p>“Of course, my happiness will be the source of hope, quite the standard you set being I the most miserable of the witches,” she huffs as she clears away a tear with the back of her hand.</p><p>“You know that’s not what I meant, Auntie Zee. I…” he sighs and leans back in his chair.  “For years, I’ve observed you hide away from everyone. Protecting yourself from whatever anyone threw at you, be that bad or good. You guard yourself inside the walls you’ve built around you, barely letting yourself be, if only around Auntie Hilda and Sabrina… and me. I don’t think neither of them has seen you in the way I saw you. In the way... I saw your parents threatening you, treating you poorly, and the way you kept it all in. The way you never complained and never let Aunt Hilda know any better about how awful they were with anyone who wasn’t her or Uncle Edward.” He says, barely risking a glance towards her. Zelda’s eyes fill with unshed tears. “I know part of what you’ve been through, I watched it happen and did nothing to stop it.”</p><p>“There was nothing you could’ve done, Ambrose. You weren’t but a child.” She whispers, acknowledging that what he thinks he saw was real. Her voice hoarse from the tears she’s not shedding. For the memories, she’s keeping inside. For the embarrassment of being caught being weak and vulnerable by her nephew.</p><p>“But I could’ve. I could’ve stood up for you the way you stood up for me and Aunt Hilda. The way you always stood up for your family. Sometimes I feel I’m failing you. Not them, not the Spellman name but you.”</p><p>“Never, Ambrose. You could never fail me. You care too much for everyone that matters,” she whispers, pressing his hand tightly. “Your parents would’ve been proud of you; of the man you became.”</p><p>“And you, Auntie Zee?” He wonders, risking a glance towards her. “Are you proud of me now?”</p><p>“There’s not a second I wasn’t. Not even when you tried to blow up the Vatican,” they chuckle tearily. “You, Sabrina, Hilda… I live through you, I’ve lived through you most of my life,” she sighs and rests her head back. “I shouldn’t have burdened none of you with fulfilling what I couldn’t. You shouldn’t carry my weight.”</p><p>“I’m not. I’m just explaining myself; quite poorly, I suppose... My comment, before… It’s not because you are the most miserable of the witches, but because I’ve seen you suffering a lot. To the point of not being allowed to be who you really are… So, my hopes lie in knowing that you can be happy. There’s so much hope for all of us if you can free yourself of the self-imposed prison your family pushed you to build.  Well, they, and whatever happened on your last trip.” He shrugs. “Now, what do you say if we rush to the dining room? I’m certain they won’t be saving us any food if we don’t show up.”</p><p>Zelda nods and they stand up. They walk across the building to get themselves to the dining room, “Ambrose,” the redhead says before they part. He stops and turns to watch her. “Thank you, I guess I needed that.”</p><p>“You’ll always have my support, Auntie Zee. Theirs too,” he says, turning to look where Sabrina and Hilda are sitting. “Even if it seems unlikely. They too will have your back and accept you in any way you chose to present yourself to them.”</p><p>That’s the last dinner they have without the looming fear falling over their shoulders. The next morning, things are calm at the Spellman Mortuary as they prepare to celebrate the Hare Moon, and Zelda finds herself wondering if the other shoe is about to drop.</p><p>“They offended the Dark Lord and so he withdrew his gifts from them a little at a time and then all at once… They offended him, and we…. We dethroned and imprisoned him.” Ambrose says, and that leads them to learn what Lily hasn’t disclosed to Zelda. That her throne in hell wasn’t really hers but belonged to Zelda’s sixteen years old half-mortal niece. And while Sabrina claims she did it to save the realms and stabilize the balance, Zelda notices just how much her niece had grabbed all her terrible traits. The need for power, <em>her </em>need for power, ingrained at her by centuries of growing under the Spellman name, comes biting at her in the ass in form of a white-haired sixteen years old with a savior complex now turned Queen of Hell.</p><p>It’s Ambrose who defuses their quarrel, and it’s he who gets the glare when Sabrina mentions Lilith. The High Priestess lets the warlock conclude that the now most likely ‘ex-Auntie Lily,’ has not informed his Aunt about the current change on the infernal court.</p><p>Lilith is surprised, and a bit amused to see Ambrose Spellman in Hell. She wonders how is it that the teenage Queen ended up with her cousin as her bodyguard of sorts, not that two magical beings with almost not existing magic could do any more damage than the already existing one Sabrina Spellman created just by signing her name… Well, and dying and rebirthing…</p><p>She wants to laugh at the innocence of the Spellman kids, not quite different from hers when she first figured it out that, despite the rivalry between Heaven and Hell, Lucifer’s powers are angelic, and thus, all witches under his control use magic from the place they abhor. Lilith found it appalling at first, then she simply thought it was a bit ironic, and finally, she stopped caring at all where did it come from. As sure as Lucifer existed, the demoness powers didn’t come from him, but her master had bound her to him, taking advantage of her stupid need to prove herself worthy of him and creating the book of the beast.  Not that she would ever disclose this to them.</p><p>As she talks with the junior Spellmans, Lilith feels Zelda’s rage. Wondering what could’ve caused it and how it relates to the visit she’s currently attending to. Yet, she’s thankful for two things on this tour of theirs. One, it was a rather short one, a quick Q&amp;A that could’ve been an email. Well, if hell had that internet thing. And two, that Ambrose Spellman was so excited to be there that he had failed to see the Academy’s codex prognostica lying between the books that covered her desk.</p><p>Back home, Zelda seethes for the lies, or so she tells Hilda. It’s not quite the lies either, it’s the fact that if things are to remain like they are, they, the entire coven, would need to bow to Sabrina. That the redhead had thought she had raised a caring child, yet, in a bout of love-sickness, the half-mortal had the nerve to overthrown the most rejected woman in history when Lilith was about to get the kingdom she was promised at the beginning of time, and she finds this appalling.</p><p>It’s also the weight of her own lies, be that hiding her love for Lilith or that she’s not a true Spellman, and how having raised another not true Spellman herself is creating havoc with everything they knew, with everything they thought was once set on stone.</p><p>And it’s fear… Fear of being so antiquated and obsolete for this unknown world that’s developing right under her feet. Crumbling as she stands right at the precipice of it all. Terrified that she will fall and fail and there won’t be anyone there to save her. Pushed and shoved to the ground, set aside to rot. Because she also realizes that no matter how much she loves Lilith, their relationship is as star-crossed as the sun and moon are.</p><p>It’s that agony -that leaves her breathless- that comes out from her mouth. Zelda’s own misery and own futureless relationship that will burn before it has time to ship. Unable to allow herself to be the vulnerable one, and cry into her sister’s shoulder for the mother of the broken hearts she carries, the High Priestess lashes at her sister.</p><p>The Directrix sees the way she’s breaking sweet little Hilda, and it torments her. She’s happy for her little sister, yet she’s so terribly jealous of how much easier life had been for her. How little she’s felt pain beyond the ones the redhead caused her herself.  And even if the High Priestess knows she’s projecting her own insecurities, behaving just like Hilda’s parents did her entire life, Zelda can’t stop the words that pour out bitter from her mouth.</p><p>There are aching truths in her words. “I’m highly unsurprised and resigned,” the redhead says. She’s been coming to terms with these abandonment issues she has right since Hilda walked out to find her job. When Sabrina was never home anymore, and Ambrose… Ambrose had exchanged their reading nights for a passionate young boy and now Prudence and the academy’s library...</p><p>And Lilith? Well, Zelda was sure she was going to choose Hell over her… Who is Zelda Phiona Spellman, anyway? If not a bitter old woman with too many traumas and issues to behave as more than a stern Directrix. Why wouldn’t they all walk away from her? So, instead of having to watch Hilda doing it, abandoning her for a mortal incubus, she pushes her sister away.</p><p>As she always did with anyone who dared to come near her before… Until Lilith.</p>
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<a name="section0037"><h2>37. Chapter 37</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Oh! look! there's a plot!<br/>Merry Yuletide if you celebrate it. Blessed Litha, if happen to be in the Southern Hemisphere.<br/>Happy Solstice!<br/>(and yes, I've posted this because I totally forgot to add those three lines in here)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There’s something that nags at the back of Zelda’s mind. It’s the fact that she had felt the withdrawal of Lucifer’s powers, with a mild cold, but she hasn’t lost her magic in the same way the others have. And although she finds no difference between herself and the other witches of their coven beyond her age. There’s no explanation why she has access to her magic, and they don’t.</p><p>After all, she is the Head of Lilith’s church and she knows the Dark… Lucifer… has heard them pray to his former handmaiden. So, why wouldn’t he take the chance to strip her of all her power?  She wants to bring these doubts to Lilith since as Sabrina has pointed, the demoness has quite the vast knowledge about things in general -and magic in particular- but there’s no time.</p><p>The High Priestess concludes that it’s Lucifer’s way to turn the coven against her, if or when, they find out that even now; she has access to the extent of her powers, while the coven is almost drained of it. Then, as if to distract her from her current thoughts, Sabrina comes in and the High Priestess listens to the mad plan of her sister and niece, feeling pride bubbling underneath her skin for this solution of sorts they managed to come up with.</p><p>Remembering Ambrose’s words, that they will accept her as she presents to them, she thanks them, and the redhead can read the surprise in the younger witches’ faces as she does. As if they never expected her to be kind to them or worse as if they never realized how much they are worth to her. Huffing her feelings away the moment they leave the room to prepare the anointing oil. She turns to Ambrose, who has this knowing smile on his face, and she rolls his eyes at him. “Do you have any other lunatic plan to add to this?” She smirks.</p><p>“It might work, Auntie.” He says, and she shakes her head. “I know it will work, Ambrose. I don’t know why, but I have faith this will help the coven. At least, it will show that we Spellmans are a united front. On different matters, have you found the Codex Prognostica?”</p><p>“Ah… sort of…” He stutters, making Zelda frown. “Should I wonder what sort of means, in this case, Ambrose?”</p><p>“It means that we are missing one of the two copies of the Tome of Tomes. I found only one of them in its rightful place. I checked the library records and… Well, it was loaned to Nick. I asked him to return it, and… We might have an issue…” he sighs.</p><p>“What it would be?” The redhead asks, already pressing the bridge of her nose, to stop the headache that most likely will come from whatever her nephew will disclose.</p><p>“Since they are both copies of the same book, I already started my research with the one that’s still at the library. I thought, nevertheless, that you would want to know that there is a copy of a prophecies book somewhere inside a mortal’s cottage. Nick says he took it to Mary Wardwell’s cottage when they confronted Lilith before Sabrina killed her mandrake self. But he never retrieved it.”</p><p>“So, someone needs to pay a visit to the Wardwell woman and check for the codex there,” She sighs. “We can only hope that she hasn’t found it or can’t understand a word of what it says. Who knows what could happen if she’s privy to that knowledge.” She frowns.</p><p>“We could send Sabrina to search for it, she will be less suspicious of all. I don’t see you or I search for a woman we never met.”</p><p>“Yes, I agree. But celebrations first, before we can even think about how to retrieve a book, when we don’t know if it’s there.”</p><p>“Where else could it…” He starts but then he sees the way his Aunt is looking at her. “Lilith. Did she mention anything at all to you? That makes you believe she could have it?” Zelda shook her head and started a new cigarette. “She mentioned that there’s an incomplete prophecy about how to re-establish the balance of powers, but she said she hadn’t gotten to it, yet.”</p><p>“So, you consider that it must have to involve Sabrina?” He wondered. Zelda shook her head. “I’ll be more worried if it didn’t, Ambrose. There’s a chance that it is related to Lilith or Lucifer… We won’t know until we read it. But…”</p><p>“Not until after the celebrations,” Ambrose ended the conversation standing up. Their time was up, and they needed to get to the woods.</p><p>Of course, with the balance nowhere near being stable, it’s not a surprise for them to find out there are pagans in their woods.  And it’s not just any pagans but Gods and demigods walking among their witches, Zelda reckons by the strength of their power. Something that no one else seems to pick up. The Directrix knows they have assessed, and quite rightly, that the coven is powerless. All except her. There’s something in the way their leader looks at her that makes her confident that at least she’s been taking into consideration, even if she doesn’t quite know to what.</p><p>Worried about this intrusion, they try to scatter them away with a storm. However, as she joins hands with them, she feels her powers being siphoned out of her and towards her family members as if she’s recharging them first before they can do anything. It’s the first time her magic does something on the like, and it scares her they will know the extent of her powers, and by doing so, she loses her concentration and the storm clouds disappear as fast as they summoned it.</p><p>“Now something has happened, it’s clear,” the pagan leader says, later on, and looks at Zelda as if he’s privy to something she isn’t, “and our time has come around again” and the threat it’s left at the clearing while they walk away.</p><p>Still, the Spellmans are sure they have hit rock bottom, so they only hope that the moon bath Hilda suggested will work in the way they need. Until there’s no celestial body in the sky. What Zelda doesn’t know is that a triple moon had to be drawn on Hilda’s moon pie for their spell to work, and he does this because he’s Pan. For someone as old as himself, it’s quite easy to figure who she is, even when the redhead herself doesn’t know. Conferring with Circe, Pan discovers she too has reached the same conclusion. However, they both have also agreed that the redhead Satanist isn’t aware of the thing that would save her coven. Her powers aren’t fully awakened, and they are under a tight control that tells them she won’t disclose them or won’t use them unless it’s a life and death threat, and maybe not even then.</p><p>However, the High Priestess was so tormented during her life that she’s afraid to expose herself to save their coven and only end up in a fire pit after that. She decides that’s better to free Lucifer and deal with the consequences of having him dethroned and imprisoned than to die a slow death out of the fear her powers can create.  Yet, it seems that someone up in Heaven or down in Hell has it against them. The Dark Lord has escaped, leaving behind a highly drugged warlock, and Zelda fears greatly.</p><p>It’s not only the powerless coven against the pagans. It’s Lucifer on the run, it’s Lilith’s life. It’s Blackwood on the run, it’s her life. She wonders how on Earth had this year go so wrong when it’s not even about to be done. And what’s even worse… she doesn’t even have the time or a way to warn her love about her master’s escape.</p><p>With Ambrose occupied with Nicholas, Agatha, and Dorcas. Zelda snatches the codex prognostica in search of that heaven forsaken prophecy. She needs to know how her niece and Lucifer are tied up to it before it’s too late.</p><p>As she’s reading it, there’s a commotion outside, and soon, Melvin is knocking at her door telling her that there are demons at the Grand Hall. She recognizes quickly most of them and assumes the surfer-boy is the one Sabrina mentioned before. The one claiming the throne of hell. Zelda wants to roll her eyes at him. Of course, this will be a battle of wills of a sixteen-year-old child against a handsome-looking fella that most likely was thousands of years younger than Lilith. She wants to scream that they make no sense, that at least Lilith knows the ins and outs of Hell, while most likely these kids could barely understand how to rule over the vast realm that comprises the nine circles of Hell.</p><p>It’s just preposterous in her head that two kids are disputing it as if Hell was a toy they didn’t want to share. But they never bought or understood. And of course, Sabrina will refuse to do this because Nick is getting a clean up as if there are not enough witches in their coven to check upon a young warlock that had ingested a drug too many.</p><p>“The balance of the cosmos has tipped,” Lilith adds, and Zelda knows this to be the truth. “The arrival of the pagans. Your coven’s loss of power. It’s all a direct result of your refusal to claim, absolutely, the throne.” The demoness continues, and no matter how painful the words sound to the redhead’s ears, deep down she knows that is the truth. It is Sabrina’s fault that the balance had tipped.</p><p>The High Priestess isn’t quite sure her niece’s absolute claim of the throne will stop this chaos that keeps dragging them around; however, Sabrina is a far better option than the unknown surfer boy.  “So as loathe as I am to agree with Lilith, you must do your duty and win,” she adds, because reality is the demoness and herself have always been on each other’s throats in public, no matter how Zelda was the High Priestess of a church devoted to Lilith. The demoness is thankful that Sabrina is focused on her Aunt because she can barely hold the smile that appears on her face with Zelda’s words. Not when there’s a rush of so much more underneath their skins, and they are both fighting the effects of their nearness. She hears it in Zelda’s voice, and she knows the Directrix has heard it in hers.</p><p>“We need a place to speak about this,” Lilith announces as soon as they accept the challenge and the demons disappear from the Academy. To give a chance to Zelda to send her as far away as she can. “You can take this to the desecrated church,” the redhead scoffs, glaring at them and soon it’s only Sabrina, Hilda, and her.  “What’s her problem?” Lilith pretends she doesn’t know Zelda at all.</p><p>“Ah, don’t mind her,” Hilda says as she walks them to the desecrated church. “Sabrina, darling, why don’t you head up to the church?” Sabrina is about to speak when a look tells her it’s not the time. She nods and walks away. “Zelda… Well, she prayed to you… a lot… And you never came to her. You never helped her.”</p><p>“Wait? You meant to tell me Zelda Spellman prayed to me?”  Lilith frowned, racking her head to figure out why she hadn’t heard the woman before in her life. Hilda nodded. “Yes, you and the Dark Lord. She was very devoted while growing until she wasn’t. I suppose, she still carries the grudge, and that you came for my niece without Sabrina asking or needing your help makes it all worse.”</p><p>“I haven’t heard a prayer from Zelda in my life, Hilda. I’ve heard yours, and Sabrina’s… but never Zelda’s… Not until a few weeks back when she led the coven into a prayer.” Lilith whispers, feeling utterly confused by this new information she was given.</p><p>“Well, maybe you should find a way to explain that to her at some point.” She shrugs. “Not now though, Sabrina is bound to come out in a moment to ask you if you are going to help her with this contest or not. So, you should go.”</p><p>“Thank you for that information, Hilda.” The blonde smiles cheerily. “Don’t mention it, and I really mean don’t mention it. If she knows I told you she will kill me, and as magic is… I’m not sure I can be revived.” She adds nervously, then she frowns… For a second, Hilda thought she had felt something similar to Lilith’s magic before… when she found Zelda and that human teddy bear… “No, they hate each other,” Hilda chuckles at the weird ideas her mind is providing and blames it to the wonky way magic is working.</p><p>Then Lilith sits with Sabrina in one bench of the church they haven’t used since Ambrose failed execution, and when she’s finally sure there won’t be a chance for Sabrina to get the item they need, there goes the kid and pulls yet another trick from under her sleeve. Seriously, Lilith thinks that girl is just too damn lucky compared to anyone else she knows.</p><p>Leaving the girl at the church, Lilith goes in search of the one Spellman she needs. She finds him at the library. “Ambrose Spellman,” she calls him, and he turns. “May I have a word with you?” Lilith asks, and he spares a glance towards Agatha. “It must be quick, I’m waiting on Prudence to check upon her sisters.” He nods and takes her to a side where they won’t be seen. “What can I help you with…” he trails, “I’m not sure how to call you.”</p><p>“Lilith has worked for millennia,” she says, finding amusing the way he stares at her, eyes widened and in some sort of terrified awe. “The codex prognostica, do you have another copy lying around the academy?”</p><p>“Y-yes.”</p><p>“Where is it?” She questions quickly. He smiles nervously. “Aunt Zee has it. She was checking up on some prophecies about reestablishing the equilibrium of the cosmos.” He says and finds Lilith with closed eyes and inhaling deeply, before she asks, “What has she told you about it?”</p><p>“Nothing, just that there seems to be one, but she can’t recall it. Which I find weird. She usually is very good at remembering what she reads,” he states. “I was going to do that search for her, but we have one of the weird sisters drove into madness and the other one turned to stone, and a warlock on rehab to check upon.”</p><p>“Right. In the hypothetical case that you can get to the codex, can you check page 999 for me? And check if the sixth one of that page is complete? I have the copy of your book that Mr. Scratch forgot in Mary’s cottage, and it is incomplete.” She doesn’t tell him that just like his Auntie Zee, she hasn’t recalled this entry until she read it. As if something blocked this entry from her sight or memory.</p><p>She feels Zelda near, and she excuses herself to go to Dorian’s as agreed with Sabrina. The last thing she needs is having her redhead in the front of her mind while standing in the middle of Golgotha when there’s a great chance of having a visit for the annoying angels of her father’s.</p><p>As she supposed, the moment Sabrina disappears, she gets Bezaliel in front of her. “Why are the realms still in chaos, Lilitu?” he asks, and she must roll her eyes at him.</p><p>“Perhaps because your father has thrown an impossible job upon my shoulders as he always does with women?” She throws back at him. He crooks his head and eyes her.</p><p>“Was not a woman the one that created the chaos that started it all?” He asks. She huffs. “It doesn’t matter, I won’t do it. I won’t lie with a man who believes it's better than me because he has a penis and I don’t. I won’t replace Ze…” she stops herself from completing her name and shakes her head. “I won’t take a man, even if that means the realms will be in this disorder until He decides He’s done with it. Haven’t I suffered enough on the hands of his creations?”</p><p>“I don’t understand, Lilitu. I thought you would be happy with the development…” Bezaliel frowns. “Why aren’t you? The prophecy…”</p><p>“The prophecy is incomplete. So, spare me from having to figure out what the heavens it meant!” She hisses. The angel frowns. “What do you mean by incomplete, where have you searched for it?”</p><p>“The codex prognostica, obviously. It wasn’t available in the one existing on Hell. Why?” she frowns. “If it is as old as you say it is.” He caresses sharp cheeks and smiles. “Oh, Lilitu. It wasn’t yours to read then. However, perhaps you are searching in the wrong place now? Why are you looking into Hell’s records when you know everything comes from the same place?”</p><p>“So you’ll rather have me, a demon, roaming inside the Vatican’s documents?” She huffs.</p><p>“No, but our father says it will make sense soon. Perhaps you don’t need a church, but a different kind of witch. Speaking of witches, I shall go, the one you brought along, the new chaos creator, it’s coming on your way.” The moment he disappears, Sabrina shows up.</p>
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<a name="section0038"><h2>38. Chapter 38</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Just so you guys don't get too much hope up... I really suck at binge-watching anything, so I most likely will stop using the show background around the end of P3, and hopefully before we get P4 out.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Things become quite hectic. Zelda must chuckle at her own crazy ideas when she notices there seems to be one Spellman for every situation that has been forced upon them since nearing Sabrina’s baptism as if someone had planned for them to exist at the same time to try to fix what no one could. Especially in the past hours. First the angel’s blood idea, then the moon bathing. Now… they are relying upon ancient rocks to harmonize with them. Yet, there are still forces at play they have no control on.</p><p>Since everything so far has seemed to lead to a point where it all begins to work, but it fails at the very last moment. Surely, the Directrix hits her rock once more, “Lungere Nobis Covina,” she joins the incantation and notices the energies rising. She feels it in every cell of her body, making her shiver as she contains her own magic that is threatening to free itself and join the circle. “Ambrose, it’s working, the stones are harmonizing,” she lets out with a trembling voice. However, she knows it might not be enough.</p><p>Using the rocks to hide the origin of her magic, the redhead waves the hand holding the tuning fork and sends a surge of her powers to join the circle then she joins the chanting again. However, as before, something happens that breaks their joint magic, as if someone wants her to use her powers no matter what she tries for not having to.</p><p>It’s a threat, Zelda knows, that Lucifer freed Agatha to kill them all. To show them how they can’t be safe from him or without him, and it adds to the one that Melvin comes shouting about. The High Priestess wonders if any other witch in her position had ever tried to deal with as many ominous things at once as they are constantly dealing with. She feels defeated, and fears what might come to them if they can’t find something else to do to protect themselves… As much as she fears what might come to her if she does what she thinks she will be forced to do.</p><p>A shiver runs down Lilith’s spine as she teleports where Sabrina is. The current is announcing to her that Zelda is nearby, at her office most likely. The mother of demons shakes off the fear and defeat she feels coming from her redhead and focuses on the child that sits crying quietly in the darkness of a room. It’s not the first time this teen moves something inside the demoness. Lilith knows too damn well what is like to be lonely, and even if this young adult is heartbroken, she also knows the girl is far from alone.</p><p>“Didn’t anyone tell you? Queens aren’t allowed to cry,” she says, cleaning a tear from her eyes. It’s not only the Queens, she knows. It’s all the strong women who are beyond broken and are still fighting their daily battles against the world and themselves. Lilith knows this, she’s lived it. She’s seen it happen thousands of times in known and unknown mortals and witches alike. Even in this kid who has too many traits of her Aunt Zelda. The first witch will blame her link with the High Priestess if anyone asked her why she feels tenderness towards this child that has taken everything away from her and keeps throwing scraps towards her while leaving all the work on her hands. Just like her father and not quite like him.</p><p>It’s not half an hour later that Lilith finally understands the fear that has been running rampant underneath her skin. The Dark Lord is free and not one of the Spellmans thought about letting her know about this threat to her life. She’s not the Queen of Hell, and yes, she might have demons loyal to her… but Lucifer would take over Hell in no time, and her head certainly will have a price.</p><p>Back at the Academy, Zelda frowns to keep Ambrose from knowing the sudden distress she feels coming from Lilith. She wonders what could’ve happened, but the redhead knows there’s nothing much she can do either. The Directrix can only hope this fear doesn’t mean Lucifer has found her Lily. Yet, there’s no time to dwell on it. They need to cover all the windows and doors with the warding oil Ambrose made and as they start; she feels it. Magic coming from several witches approaching them.</p><p>“Why did you bring us here?” Gryla asks and looks at Zelda. Not as the High Priestess of the Church of Lilith, but as the one witch responsible for summoning them. The one whose energies they felt and compelled them to show up at the Academy. “You summoned us against our will, Zelda Spellman,” she continues, not giving her time to explain. Save the one Ambrose recognizes, Zelda knows these witches, they know her too… Enough to read her magic’s signature on the distress call they made. The redhead hadn’t considered her powers would be the ones amplified and let out, and now, she must think on her feet to get these witches to cooperate with them instead of killing them.</p><p>The eldest Spellman is quite surprised to feel the powers of the one she doesn’t know. ‘Mambo Marie’ she recalls, as the witch steps in to stop the others. Suddenly, the issue is disabled, and Zelda finds she needs Hilda around, in case she must act and separate herself from the Spellman family as she fears she will need sometime soon.</p><p>“Find your Aunt Hilda, will you? She should be here…” the redhead adds in a whisper, as she reigns in her magic even tighter. If she’s needed to strip herself of her adopted family name away willingly, there should be a Spellman in the room to take over their legacy. Hilda should be there to take over what was her right from the very beginning of her life.</p><p>If there’s one thing, the Directrix can’t afford to show, is the fear she is feeling underneath her skin. Yet, as she faces them, Zelda can’t stop herself from worrying about what’s going on with Lilith.</p><p>The High Priestess offers them what she knows they always wanted -to belong- and honesty… or as much honesty as she can without giving herself away. In this chaotic world, they are living in, that is still a lot.</p><p>As Ambrose gathers their information, later on, Zelda takes the book and heads to another room. She needs to find that heaven-forsaken prophecy, or see Lilith. Either or will do now. She reads several pages before she feels the tug of her Lily’s nearness. She follows it to the Academy’s doors and wonders why the demoness hasn’t just transported herself inside.</p><p>“Lilith, what in heaven are you doing here? What’s wrong?” Zelda whispers. They both can feel there’s someone else near. The magic she had felt earlier coming from Mambo Marie.</p><p>It’s not like Zelda doesn’t like the witch, it’s just that she distrusts everyone at first sight, and that witch it is not an exception. So, demoness and High Priestess play the game they know too well. Being on each other’s throats, pushing the other away, because it’s easier to shove someone away than trying to protect someone they couldn’t possibly help.</p><p>Negating her asylum hurts, being negated asylum it’s painful too. They know this, as the agony they are feeling it’s shared with the other one. There’s more to this rejection on Zelda’s side than it is showing, and Lilith understands this… Still, it pains her. Zelda steps in closer, wanting nothing more than to bring her love close and comfort her when she can barely comfort herself. Yet, Lilith realizes what her darling is about to do, and claims the coven is a “pathetic lot.”</p><p>The redhead mouths ‘the cottage’ as Lilith keeps her rant going. The demoness understands that whatever’s happening, the High Priestess is in a complex position because of whoever might be listening. Answering in the same manner with a short ‘meet me there ASAP’, before she continues, “what good are witches against his wrath?” loudly for their play’s sake.</p><p>The first witch want’s nothing more than to raise her hand, caress a soft cheek and pull soft lips over hers. With the years of experience, she fights herself easily, turning around and away from her temptress before whoever is watching them can see something they mustn’t. The Directrix doesn’t flinch at her Lily’s words, because she understands what the brunette isn’t saying. “No, what I need is a good Christian woman,” Lilith adds, just to further dig the nail in as just how much they ‘hate’ each other.</p><p>“Why you rejected a powerful witch, Cherie?” the recently arrived witch asks, eyes squinted in wonder. “I believe you heard every word we exchanged, Mambo Marie… That’s how I should call you, n'est-ce pas?”</p><p>“Mais oui, that is my name,” Marie says, with a coquettish smile. Zelda feels flattered to be considered attractive under the eyes of this far younger witch. However, the High Priestess has plenty in her hands, and underneath her skin, to even consider what the other woman might be offering. “I must return to my reading if you’ll excuse me, Mambo Marie.”</p><p>Zelda escapes to her room. On her way she asks one student to fetch Ambrose for her, wondering where on Earth is Hilda when she needs her. She doesn’t even have the time to find her. “You called, Auntie?” Ambrose says the moment she tells him to come in. “Ambrose, I need to… step out for a moment… Whenever you can, please try to give this one a read. I’ve marked my progress; it’s not much, but at least I’ve managed a few hundred pages.”</p><p>“Of course, Auntie… is everything all right?” He wonders, seeing the state his, usually very composed, Aunt is. “I…” she sighs. Tears shine brightly in her eyes. “No, I need to find Lily. I might have done something utterly stupid for us; yet, it’s what’s safest for the coven.”</p><p>“You kicked her out,” Ambrose states, and rubs his face. “I’m sorry, Auntie. I’m sorry you draw the short straw… again.” Zelda huffs. “I guess once you get one, you can get them all. I’m not sure how long I will be out, Ambrose. You must keep them occupied. You can tell them I’m searching for Hilda… They won’t contest with that.”</p><p>“Right. Go, Auntie… Wait, without magic, how are you?” He asks, but his Aunt isn’t in the room anymore by the time he adds his final words. “going to find her?” He finishes, shaking his head and grabbing the book. Once he’s done with the registries, he will find page 999 and search what Lily asked.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” Zelda says the moment she materializes at her cottage where Lilith is already waiting for her. She has lost the stupid headscarf that did nothing to hide who she was. It’s a blink later, and the demoness finds herself engulfed in the redhead’s arms. “I’m so, so, sorry, Lily.” She whispers.</p><p>“Why? That’s all I need to know…” Lilith says, icy blues shining with unshed tears. “I’m not rejecting you, Lily. I’m trying my best to protect the coven. We both know the Dark Lord won’t stop until he finds you, be that trapped inside Faustus or not. Even if I’m dying to have you there, standing by my side while we face whatever these pagans are planning for us, I can’t help to fear that it would lead to a double attack from Lucifer if he knows you are in our ranks.”</p><p>“I hate that you are right,” the demoness grimaces. “It’s not less painful, but keeping me away from your coven is a smart strategy,” she sighs. “I’m just… I’m terrified, Zelda. I’ve lived far more lives than anyone you’ll ever know, however, I’m not ready to die. Not when I just found you…”</p><p>“I’m not ready to let you go, either, Lily. Not when there are so few shared moments.”</p><p>“I need you to agree to something, Zelda. I need you not to be angry at me or come search me if I step into the Academy’s library,” Lilith says seriously as she remembering Bezaliel words. “I need to find the rest of that prophecy. I need to figure out how to restore the balance.”</p><p>“You? Why you?”</p><p>“Because the prophecy is about me, Zelda. I was the first one to break the equilibrium when I created the book of the beast. It took millennia until the Fake Lord fixed it. But, he had warned me that when the time came that it broke again, I would have to fix.”</p><p>“How can you even manage that?” The redhead frowns. “I don’t know… If I knew, I would’ve tried it already.” Lilith lies and caresses the cheeks she loves with the tip of her fingers. “Zelda?”</p><p>“Yes?” The High Priestess answers with her lips almost grazing the ones she misses. “Fix me one last time?” Lily asks in this soft tone, there’s no way Zelda says no to it. Their mouths collide, hungry, and saddened. This might be their last time, their one last chance at being whole in each other’s arms. So, it’s not strange when they kiss the saltiness of their tears as they divest the other of their clothes reverently.</p><p>Their hands find skin oh so very softly that every inch of the other’s skin is covered with goosebumps. Beneath it, they are overwhelmed by the love that overflows their bodies. Hands move up and down, caressing, scratching, memorizing. Then mouths follow, nipping, licking, kissing…</p><p>With her mind set on getting the woman she loves to new heights, Zelda can’t help to consider how different everything would’ve been, had they met at another time. How maybe they would’ve been allowed for far more than a few stolen moments… Maybe a lifetime together as a couple.</p><p>The redhead can’t help either, the image of her Lily carrying their child. No matter how impossible it could be, even if they are witches. Yet, she sees vividly how the demoness shyly announces to her they are somehow with child. She sees the pregnancy moving along. Soon, Zelda sees herself as the midwife of her own offspring. Saying encouraging words to her love as she pushes life out of her womb. A life they made together, yet don’t know quite how it happened.</p><p>Zelda sees the child, now a toddler, and has beautiful heterochromia that allows her (or him, she isn’t quite sure. She doesn’t care either, it’s hers!) to sport both of his mothers’ eyes. In an icy blue and a deep ocean green gaze. The child’s hair is a deep auburn that shines as a fiery red under the sun, and it’s almost black under the cover of the night. His ghostly white skin is covered with freckles. The toddler is such a mix of them both, that’s impossible to doubt that the two witches are indeed the biological parents.</p><p>The longing settles deep in the High Priestess’s heart, and a tear rolls down her cheek. She hides her face in Lilith’s neck. She feels robbed of a future, any future, with her. Shaking herself, the redhead kisses and bites the available skin, creating a chorus of moans out of her darling. The Directrix doesn’t know she’s shared this image with the writhing woman as a memory for later on. A strangled cry of agony for what they won’t have gets stuck in Zelda’s throat as they rock together.</p><p>Feeling utterly powerless, the redhead can’t help but cast a protection spell over her Lily. The only thing she can do that won’t cause harm to her coven, to the powerless children she’s failing, out of the fear of her own future. Zelda hopes this spell will be enough to keep her love from harm’s way, yet she knows it won’t.</p><p>“Lily,” she shouts and cries as fingers fill each other’s emptiness vastly. It is love at its most and yet, it’s the bittersweet notion that this is it. There won’t be more. “I l-lo,” Lilith is about to let out for the first time, but they are crossing the bridge and Zelda’s mouth is on her, swallowing the words away.</p><p>Tears haven’t stopped streaming down their faces since they embraced. Yet, they can’t seem to let go of each other as they cuddle. Limbs tangled together and bodies searching for the warmth they won’t be able to share until they find a solution for all their problems, which are many and burden their shoulders heavily.</p><p>“Zelda, love?” Lilith whispers, trying not to break the cocoon that always surrounds them when they are vulnerable like this. “Hm?” the redhead hums, caressing the soft skin of her back with the tip of her fingers and causing a bout of goosebumps after another on the brunette. </p><p>“Apart from longing for someone who loves you without fear of your powers… What’s the other thing you always wanted and couldn’t have?” The demoness asks softly, hoping for an answer that she could somehow fulfill.</p><p>Zelda thinks for a while and moves until they are lying sideways, facing each other. She pecks the lips she loves, knowing the answer will pain the demoness. “A child,” she confesses shyly, eyes wrinkling at the corners and a blush covering her skin. “I always wanted a child of my own, but never happened,” she adds, placing a soft strand of brown hair behind her love’s ear.</p><p>“Of course,” Lilith chuckles between tears. “Of all the things I can bestow upon you… you’ll find the one thing I can’t possibly help you with,” she sniffles. “I’m always failing you, Zelda… even when I try not to.”</p><p>“You aren’t, love. I’m not requesting you to give me one. I’m just answering your questions with the truth. Besides, you are already someone who loves me in the way I am. You haven’t tried to change one hair on my head. Even when we are just mean at each other when we aren’t alone. Sure, I always longed for a child I can’t have, I guess it is almost prophetic that I can’t keep you, nor have a child. It sounds like a proper punishment for a silly witch who tried to dethrone Lucifer to allow her love to reign in Hell and hoped coming out unscathed from it.”</p><p>Lilith bites her lips then, trying to contain the cry that is risking starting. She hasn’t cried this much since… well, ever, and yet she now seems unable to stop. “I’m so sorry, Zelda. You should have the world, darling, and all you get is a faulty witch that has lived far too long and screwed things up beyond anyone else abilities.”</p><p>“Yet, I wouldn’t have you any other way, Lily. You wouldn’t understand half of me if you were any different. If we weren’t stuck in the lives we led, I wouldn’t be able to comprehend why you behave in the ways you do, and you wouldn’t understand my trepidation either. We… we are quite the pair. Yet, we are just oddly perfect for each other, aren’t we?”</p><p>“Yeah.” Lilith barely lets out. “We should go soon. You can stay here or come back whenever you need to, Lily. And of course, I won’t search for you if I feel you at the academy. It will cost me greatly, but I will keep my promise.”</p><p>“I’m always getting impossible promises out of you,” the demoness shakes her head sadly. “And I’m always trying to fulfill them. I never stopped searching for a way to you, you know?”</p><p>“I figured,” She smiles. “Zelda?” She asks again remembering Hilda’s words. “Yes, love?” the redhead answers, searching the eyes she loves and that she will miss. “Just so you know, I loved hearing you pray for the first time.”</p><p>“For the first time?” The witch wonders. “Lilith, I’ve prayed for you most of my life, until…” she waves dismissively. “What do you mean for the first time?”</p><p>“When you led your coven to pray to me? That was the first time I’ve heard you pray.” Zelda looks at her, befuddled by this. “You mean to tell me, all those years where I prayed for you daily, you never once listened to them? How does that even work?”</p><p>“I’m not sure myself, all I know is if someone prays to me, I hear it in the back of my mind. There aren’t that many, never a full coven until yours. Never you, until it was on your coven’s behalf.” Zelda chuckles dryly at this.</p><p>“No wonder no one ever answered them. I suppose my faith isn’t even worthy of being background noise in your mind. It doesn’t matter now, Lily. What I wonder is why Lucifer is still bestowing his powers on me? While the rest of the coven is… Oh, heavens! Perhaps he thought I would lead him to you! We need to go, Lily… We need to go, now!”</p><p>With a wave of their hands, they are dressed. Panicking about the possibility of being caught. Another wave later and they are exchanging small mirrors and laughing at their synchronicity. “Find me when you can, I’ll try to answer,” Zelda says, and kisses her. “I love you,” she adds as she parts and waving her hand once more, she stands in the middle of her room at the mortuary and Lilith is nowhere around.</p><p>“I love you, Zelda,” is barely whispered somewhere in the middle of Greendale woods as the demoness makes her way to her next destination. As she lets those words out, a tear falls soiling the ground, and the woods howl in pain with the first woman the Earth knew. </p>
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<a name="section0039"><h2>39. Chapter 39</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Merry Xmas! (if you are celebrating this one)<br/>This chapter isn't that Christmassy though... Enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She hasn’t been gone that long, or so Zelda thinks, but when she transports herself back to the Academy, she finds the children partaking in a dance ritual that seems… Voodoo… if the words she understands from the Haitian creole that reach her ears are something to go by. She stops it. They have enough issues with their lack of head of Hell (Zelda absolutely refuses to pray to her niece) and the fact they have angered their former God. To bring the fake Lord aka Bondye to the mix.</p><p>However, this anger she feels it’s not only against the voodooist and her practices, or about Prudence’s behavior, but about the lack of time to deal with her own issues before she has to solve everyone else’s. The young witch has a point, Mambo Marie’s magic doesn’t come from Lucifer, she’s the only one that’s not attached to him, but to her own… catholic believes. But would the fake Lord return to them their powers when they’ve never believed in his word? When there are witch hunters angels that came from him? No, she couldn’t risk offending another God.</p><p>“I am Mambo Marie LeFleur, Vodouisant of the Fourth Ward,” the witch introduces herself, offering a hand covered with golden rings. The vodouisant is right, Zelda is fearsome of her presence. Not because she could challenge her status, but for the things, she might teach the young minds that have already been confused to the extremes with the fast-changing pass of the last few months.</p><p>Reluctantly, mostly of education, Zelda shakes her hand. “I can see your met-tet. He is beautiful. Powerful,” Marie says and adds some more flattery to it. There’s more, though, as if this woman really knows this moment was written somewhere. “I have been waiting for her invitation all my life. You see,” she says pulling Zelda closer, and the redhead finds herself closer to this enthralling woman. The Directrix’s magic tries to fight its way out to show this voodoo witch who she’s trying to play with; yet, she doesn’t fall for the Vodouisant’s spell. Zelda’s ‘met-tet’ might be anything the woman claims, but there are more things at risk here.</p><p>“My met-tet told, long ago, that something was coming. Something very old and very evil, and that if I could summon my courage, I might play a role in helping to beat it back,” Marie adds. Soon Zelda is asking her to stay, and she doesn’t quite know why. The knowing smirk on Prudence’s face makes her worry about having done that.</p><p>Just when Zelda had transported herself to the Academy, Lilith approaches Ms. Wardwell's cottage. However, something tells Lilith she must get herself to the Academy. Her intuition has rarely failed her, so she does. Transporting herself straight into the library, where she finds Ambrose Spellman deep in concentration over the tome of tomes.</p><p>"Is it complete?” She asks. The young warlock jumps startled off his seat. “Lilith… yes… I’m… It’s…” He stumbles to find the words to explain it. “Here,” he decides, turning the book towards the newly arrived demoness. “Please tell me you understand this, I’m struggling with some words. I could take it to Aunt Zelda, but..”</p><p>“No!” She shouts, and Ambrose raises his hands in surrender. “I mean, I’m good with languages,” she adds in a normal voice. Then approaches the table where several books are piled up and reaches for the Codex. Yet, when she searches for the one entry she needs, she can only see the beginning and the end, just like in the other tome, the whole middle is missing. “It’s damaged too…” She groans.</p><p>“What? It is not!” Ambrose says, standing next to her and seeing the full prophecy. “The equilibrium of the realms Lilîtu has broken will be justly reestablished the day the, a couple of words I don’t know, completes the rites that transform the two parts into equals. On a moonless night, the blood of the... something other. I’m sorry, Greek was never my forte,” he grimaces. “But there’s not a missing line in this.”</p><p>“You can see it all?” Lilith wonders, frowning in confusion. She remembers then Bezaliel’s words, ‘<em>Oh, Lilitu. It wasn’t yours to read then</em>’ and shakes her head. That she can’t read them, doesn’t mean she can’t hear them, she thinks. “Continue reading it. You must write the words you don’t know, just like they look in there.”</p><p>She can see Ambrose is as confused as she feels, but the young Spellman simply nods. “From the beginning, will you, please?”</p><p>
  <em>“The equilibrium of the realms Lilîtu has broken will be justly reestablished the day the κληρονόμος Χθονία completes the rites that transform the two parts into equals. On a moonless night, the blood of the klironómos will seal the same path as the cast-away child, and the moon will shed blood as equal becomes opposed and opposed becomes equal.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Centuries will pass as the δίδυμες ψυχές walk the realms unknowing to their fate until the birth of the new morning star. The dídymes psyches, Lilîtu, and klironomos will find each other again as the young morning star travels across the end of its fifteenth cycle around Helios. Their threads amalgamating as they ebb and flow under the shade of the night, to attain a majestic psyche bond. The dídymes psyches will begin to counteract the unbalance that will be created as the young morning star sears the blood pact that will walk her down the path of damnation.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Only if their psyche bond is started the Devil’s sword will rise to fulfill its own path. Heaven, Earth, and Inferno will be thrown out of their singularity. It’s not until Klironomos visits hell that it will complete its metamorphosis, and they will know of its hierarchy. Amid the reconstruction, equal psyche must be bound, and equilibrium achieved to birth the dawn of the new era and end the chaos of the morning star. Only the perfect balance between equals can correct the distortion created and reestablish what was broken, or damnation will fall upon all”</em>
</p><p>Ambrose finishes reading. He takes a while, though, because every word he doesn’t know he has to write, and he can only continue once the demoness has voiced them out loud.  “But what does it mean?” He asks, frowning at the piece of paper.</p><p>“This line,” she says, pointing to κληρονόμος Χθονία, “it’s two words, the first one appears several times as klironómos. Together they mean heir of Earth. This,” she continues, pointing to δίδυμες ψυχές. “or as you said dydymes psyches, means twin souls.”</p><p>“So basically, the fate of this realm as we know it, hangs on your ability to find a boyfriend?” Ambrose wonders. “Something like that, yes. It’s a bit more complex than this. Whoever this man is, the text points we are speaking of a warlock.” Ambrose frowns, and Lilith sighs. “I would show you where, but I can’t see it. You said the blood of the heir will seal the same path as the cast-away child. I can only assume I am the cast-away child. Since I’m the first name on the book and that’s how the equilibrium was first lost. We can assume it was restored, when… whoever he is… “</p><p>“Must have signed the book of the beast!” Ambrose finishes excitedly. “And it mentions centuries. It couldn’t possibly be a mortal if he was to survive this long. It has to be someone you met before Sabrina’s failed baptism.” He concludes. Lilith feels the energy changing in the room as Marie joins them.</p><p>“Mambo Marie,” Ambrose says, and the witch smiles, her eyes stopping on Lilith. “You were here earlier, were you not? Has not the High Priestess denied you a stay?” Marie continues walking towards the book they are reading.</p><p>“Well, what she doesn’t know won’t kill her.” Lilith shrugs. “Ah,” the voodooist says as her finger taps one line the demoness can’t see. “My met-tet told me about this.”</p><p>“What do you know?” the demoness wonders in surprise, then she’s shocked to notice… “you are a different kind of witch…” She whispers. “Mais oui, I’m a vodouisant.” Marie smiles and offers her hand. “Mambo Marie LeFleur,” she adds, before Lilith notices, darker ones trap her hand. “You are not only a witch. Your met-tet… I-I understand now…”</p><p>Shocked by Marie’s behavior, Lilith pulls her hand away as fast as she can. “What do you know?” She repeats. There’s another bright smile. Marie rushes away from the room. Moments later, she’s back, dropping a book loudly on the table. “It’s been in my family for generations.” Marie shrugs, then she carefully opens it, placing a bookmark on it. “It’s meant to be lost from your hands. Now, you should go, Cherie. And so, shall I,” the witch adds closing the book and placing it on the demoness's hands.</p><p>This time, the mother of demons reaches the cottage she lived in for months and knocks at the door. She pretends to be Adam and Mary falls for it. Sweet Mary is so worried about him she doesn’t even notice the book Lilith is carrying around.</p><p>As she had promised, Zelda remains in her office even after Marie is long gone, because she can still feel Lilith inside the academy’s walls. It’s not until her Lily is long gone that she can finally breathe again. She searches Ambrose to retrieve the tomes of tomes and finds him enthralled by one entry. “You found it,” She states, startling him. Reaching his side, she sees the beginning of one entry that has most of the middle missing. “It’s incomplete,” she huffs.</p><p>“You can’t see it?” He frowns again in confusion and gets the same confused expression he had received from Lilith. “Can you help me with these words?” Ambrose asks, pointing her to the same words he had struggled with before.</p><p>“It’s a prophecy about someone finding a soul mate,” Zelda states when she notices the words on the paper. “Twin souls, it’s an old way to refer to the broader used version of a soul mate. Not quite like the modern and mortal version of it. Twin souls aren’t halves of a whole, but two wholes that fit perfectly together. Now, this… This one means the Heir of Earth. So, whoever is the protagonist of this prophecy must find his soul mate,” she explains, fighting her voice since she still remembers Lilith announcing it was meant for her to fix what she had broken millennia ago.</p><p>“His… soul mate?” Ambrose frowns. “Yes, or Her soul mate. You must understand, Ambrose, that psyches -souls- aren’t supposed to have a gender. Also, this word can mean both, heir and heiress. So, we can be speaking of any variation of a couple as long as they fit perfectly.”</p><p>“What would a perfect equilibrium entail for a twin soul, Auntie Zee?” He wonders, because if his gut is correct… “I can only assume the couple must be completely in sync. It can take time, even for twin souls, to find it in themselves not to fight the connection. According to the myths, they are most likely heavily broken souls with a heavy burden, yet they accept each other entirely... Past, present, and future, notwithstanding. Together they can endure any tribulations..”</p><p>“Auntie Zee, you think, hmm, Lily could be yours?” He speculates, making her laugh. “Don’t be silly, Ambrose. Those are myths created by people who pretended to be complete but justified their loneliness with stories about a missing side they supposedly didn’t need. However, if we must talk about complementing energies, then we are speaking of male and female,” she shrugs. “In which case, Lily and I couldn’t be one. I’ll be in my office if you find anything else that can actually help.”</p><p>Back at Mary’s cottage, Lilith pries open the book that Mambo Marie has given her. She scrunches her nose up and opens it. “I guess after all this time, tonight we finally find all the prophecies related to this…” She mumbles as she traces her fingers over the words that welcome her to the first page. Someone on the vodouisant family was a prophet or something akin to it since the opening words are “this is what I’ve been shown off the future…”</p><p>Curious about what the witch had found of Lilith’s interest, she skips the rest to reach the marked page and her eyes widened at the words she finds.</p><p>
  <em>“And on a dark moon, as dark as the Heir of Earth’s mane, he will sign his name away. With the first drop of his vital fluid, the blood moon will shine full and its power will drop to his head.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Nature will welcome him with a feast, as equilibrium was largely missed before his arrival.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>To prepare him for the tribulations he must overcome. The Heir of Earth will twice be burned. Once by the mortals, he tried to help. Once, by fearful men of his kind.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>For he is an heir, his prays won’t be heard by anyone but the Gods, still the Exiled Wanderer, his twin soul, will find him and save him from the blazing fires he cannot escape on his own.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Henceforth, their path will be set.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>The Heir of Earth knows the world’s ways, forth he hath traveled across the lands. His heart preserved profoundly between cold walls forged of his pain.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Centuries of learning will come to pass until the Exiled Wanderer and the Heir of Earth met again.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Their energies amalgamating. His heart has no escape.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>With intermingled souls, they will share their energies. Opening the ways to what must become.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>One last closed gate will open, and the Heir of Earth will perish and will be resurrected into his new heights. Although unaware of any novelty.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>With the energetic path cleared and unblocked, the Exiled Wanderer and the Heir of Earth, together as one, will bring peace at the chaos that will come, and only in their perfect union will they will save the cosmos.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>However, these words are not the only ones that exist about the trying times they must face. These words aren’t fixed in stone, since they had granted to the Heir of Earth and the Exiled Wanderer, the free will of all creatures.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>And it’s their choice to fulfill their union and strengthen each other or bring themselves further apart.”</em>
</p><p>Her eyes widen, she knows this story. She has listened to it from the mouth of the High Priestess herself. How the new moon became a full one the moment her blood touched the pages of the Book of Lilith’s creation. How her hair had changed from the blackest of the blacks to the same shade the moon was shining onto her head. Zelda had also confessed she had been almost burned to death twice. Although, she only knows the details of one. The second one, Lilith, had never pried it out of the redhead.</p><p>However, she can’t remember saving Zelda… Unless…. “The likes of Brigid,” she mumbles, remembering the burned witch she had saved centuries ago. Was that Zelda Spellman? She wonders. But she doesn’t have time to dwell, as she feels her magic being contained and Lucifer/Blackwood entering the room.</p><p>The last thing her magic allows her to do is sent the book to a drawer of Zelda’s desk at the academy. It’s too late for Zelda to see it now since the redhead has left the premises in search of Hilda.</p><p>Everything makes so much sense now for Lilith. It wasn’t Adam. A mere mortal who had cared for the vessel she was in. He had been convenient. She hadn’t acknowledged her feelings for him. She had loved him. He had fixed parts of her she thought forever broken. Adam taught her that there were worthy men out there. Yet, he was never the one who made her heart skip a beat.</p><p>No, her blood didn’t hum with his power. He was only a mortal; he couldn’t fulfill the prophecy in the way she had thought before. Yes, one could assume that a demon-witch and a mortal was almost as close to a fallen angel-warlock-mortal… Or that him being a male would balance the forces….</p><p>But balance wasn’t just about duality, it was beyond it… Balance meant her other half should be able to keep one self-restraint beyond a normal being, respecting the other one every step of the way. This being should be able to balance its own strength and magic by itself. Even then, the love would be without restrains.</p><p>She gulps. Even when they hadn’t touched, Zelda had loved her. Lilith had felt the unwavering love coming from their mixed energies. A love so different to anything she had ever felt before, pure, ever-present... safe.</p><p>“Heaven’s! How blind could I be?” She thinks, but now it’s late… Too late. Then she realizes the change in herself, as a memory of a blue and green gaze, the laughter of an auburn-haired toddler reaches her memories.</p><p>As she readies Lucifer for the separation, Lilith smiles. Maybe she won’t be able to keep Zelda safe… but if she plans this properly, she might save herself thanks to her love, and whatever magick beyond her knowledge that has happened when they met earlier. </p><p>Placing the Dark Lord in a deep sleep, the demoness presents her proposal to Father Blackwood, who eagerly takes it.</p><p>There's a pain that hits her heart and burns throughout her body as she sinks into Blackwood’s grip. It's not coming from him or from what they are doing. </p><p>Zelda is hurt. The demoness knows this as sure as the sun will rise the next morning, or as that there’s a man inside her. He finishes his deed just as she lets herself cry out of the redhead’s pain, before falling to the side. Barely keeping herself together, the first witch quickly completes her side of the deal, engraving Cain’s mark on Faustus' wrists, before separating him from her master.</p><p>Lucifer is still asleep as the mother of demons notices her love isn’t just hurt but truly gone. Her departure forcing the demoness to her knees as all traces of the redhead’s magic sweep out of her body, leaving her alone and utterly bereft. Lilith can’t believe just how much warmer she was with the High Priestess energy running underneath her skin. Despite that, she won’t allow herself to cry, not when Lucifer could wake up at any moment now and find her vulnerable over the loss of her love. And how could she be so ungrateful to complain? When unknowingly the woman had given her a way to save her own life. When, even if she has lost her Zelda, she still hasn't lost it all.</p><p>She can't be so ungrateful to complain or want her own death when her twin soul is gone, yet Lilith will fulfill the redhead's longing, albeit too late. Even if the Spellman witch won't be there to see it. How can the first woman not try to survive, if somehow, she's carrying Zelda’s child?</p><p>In her pain, Lilith fails to notice that there's not only one but two prophecies that speak of the rebirth of her twin soul.</p>
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<a name="section0040"><h2>40. Chapter 40</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Huh, this one was supposedly going to be a short one (a one-shot even) and now we just got to chapter 40... Yikes!<br/>I guess I'm unable to do short ones anymore...</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>After killing Hilda for a good cause, for the first time, Zelda had found Dr. Cee’s cocoon and sighed. She knew Hilda would torture herself if they left him behind, and someone found him like that. So, since she was alone in the store, the redhead placed her hands over it and magicked it to the mortuary.</p><p>Then, she had teleported Hilda’s body along with herself, straight into their graveyard. Willing a shovel, she dug their Cain pit with practiced ease. Before dropping her sister’s changed body awkwardly inside and covering it with the dark soil. Using the Cain pit required manual work, as to not interfere with the ancient secrets that it keeps. It was usually the exercise that calmed Zelda from whatever rage she was in. Now, as she works to cover Hilda, a thin layer of sweat cooling her skin, she feels it differently. As if this soil’s mysteries aren’t quite there, as if the unbalance it’s taking this away from them too. Yet, she can’t afford to think like that.</p><p>What the redhead doesn’t know as she finishes her handy work, is that Mary Wardwell was watching her burying Hilda. That Sabrina’s teacher had seen her appear out of the blue carrying a Hilda-sized spider. Or that the woman, who was reading the Bible’s Exodus passage where the very foundations of witch hunters lied, had just seen Lilith changing into an image of her own body; when not long before, Faustus announced her all the Spellman’s were witches.</p><p>“Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live,” Mary muttered from her position, hiding behind the tree line. She’s aware that this Biblical quote has caused the death of so many women, mortal, and witch alike. Yet, it’s her God’s words. The Father who remained at her home with the demon who looked like Mary herself was certain about the Spellmans, and watching one of Sabrina’s aunties appear suddenly, without a sound explanation other than magic, pushes Mary to do it. Soon, Sabrina’s oldest aunt would be counted as one of the fallen ones.</p><p>But they had forged the destiny of Zelda Phiona Spellman millennia before her birth. Right when a certain woman had called God’s ineffable name and condemned herself to a punishment that would last long.</p><p>Just like Judas’s destiny was always to betray his master, Mary Wardwell’s destiny was always to awaken Lilith’s twin soul. The mortal doesn’t know this, though, as she runs away from the Spellman Mortuary, where she had never set foot before, yet knows it without a doubt. The teacher hides in the woods from the justice that surely will get her. At least, she knows she has fulfilled God’s will as she had gotten rid of a sorcerer.</p><p>Yet, once she feels the bullet entering her ribcage, the thing that annoys Zelda isn’t the bullet or that she’s going to die. It isn’t even the fact that’s a mortal, the one who kills her, or that is the one mortal that her love currently resembles. No, it’s that she can feel the betrayal of Lilith’s mating with someone else as she falls on a pool of her blood. Unconsciousness clutches at her, darkening the corners of her sight.</p><p>She sees Sabrina rushing downstairs, a look of concern etched in her youthful expression. Zelda notices Ambrose’s pained one as he rushes back to the top floors and disappears from her sight. The darkness consumes her vision and soon, Zelda Phiona Spellman lets her last breath out and without grandeur… She dies.</p><p>All she sees then is darkness. She hears dogs barking happily as if they were ecstatic to see her after being away for long. The redhead then reaches a crossroad. A cloaked figure stands tall in the middle of them, and lights torches to show her three paths.</p><p>Be her anyone else, and the High Priestess would surely feel the panic raising at this dark imagery. However, Zelda feels a love akin to the one she felt around Lilith, but different. As a mother should’ve loved her child, a love Zelda Spellman hadn’t known during her life.</p><p>Suddenly, there are three keys in her hands and the High Priestess frowns in confusion. Yet, somehow, she knows each one unlocks a door at the end of each path. But how to choose? </p><p>“This one,” a voice that she hears in her head (even if she can’t feel her body) tells her, “will stop your life, and this will be it. Zelda Phiona Spellman will die at the hands of Mary Wardwell, the mortal chosen to unlock your choosing point. Your soul will be reincarnated in the first available vessel, doomed to be reborn until your soul’s tasks are fulfilled.”</p><p>“This one,” the voice softness, “will bring you home. To the seat that’s waiting for you, yet, you will be refused to incarnate for centuries, and you won’t be allowed to see the child.”</p><p>“The child?” Zelda asks, confused. “Sabrina?” There’s a chuckle. “Haven’t you willed one, my child?” the voice says with curiosity. “I don’t understand… I longed for one but… I’ve never…” The High Priestess tries, and then, she sees the toddler she had imagined now waving at her cheerfully, a breeze of colorful joy in the middle of the vast darkness of the path. Zelda frowns, feeling bewildered.</p><p>“Finally, that one will take you back to your realm.” The voice continues. “Where you will live, love, and suffer. Grabbing your destiny will be solely in your hands. This way, is equally painful, as you must walk into your hell… The future holds a lot of fights, and you must reveal your truths. However, the love will be greater than what I could have asked for you, my sweet child,” the voice adds, and Zelda just knows the figure is smiling motherly at her.</p><p>With a caressing wind, the High Priestess sees the same image she imagined before. Lilith fearful to announce her she is pregnant with their child, and the bursting love that she felt when she embraced her love and they cried joyfully over this development. Then the image is replaced by the toddler wobbling on still not sturdy legs. The eldest Spellman woman sees Sabrina cheerfully clapping at the quivering achievement.</p><p>There’s Hilda and Doctor Cee too, who look as they are expecting a child of their own. There’s Ambrose with shiny eyes and a bright knowing smile, as he looks towards her, and then Zelda feels it. Lilith’s warmth beside her, standing close. The demoness hand gripping her hip, a mix of pride and fear as their child keeps growing. And feels her head on her shoulder that soon hides in the crook of her neck as tears fall. Then, she hears clearly the ‘I love you, Zelda,’ that leaves the brunette’s mouth with ease. At this, the redhead feels herself drop to her knees in the dark.</p><p>“Whatever you choose now, you won’t remember this conversation. You won’t remember them. You won’t remember seeing me.” The voice says sadly. “It’s time, my child, you ought to choose. What would it be, the reincarnation, the throne, or the love? You can choose wisely knowing that all three of them come with their own price.” Zelda doesn’t even struggle with it, she takes one firm step after another until there’s only a door, a key, and no way back.</p><p>She opens the door and crosses the threshold.</p><p>In the realm her body is at, it’s barely a couple of seconds, maybe a minute or two later. Zelda is dead, and the vodouisant knows this. There’s too much blood on the floor, there’s no pulse, there’s no breathing. However, her spirit guide tells her they need to remove the bullet and close the redhead’s injury. Never one to fight with her met-tet’s instructions, Marie asks for Zelda to be moved so she can operate.</p><p>Mambo Marie doesn’t tell distressed children how the High Priestess is no more, and how there’s nothing she can do about this. No, she works as her met-tet tells her to and prays as she does. With not so firm hands, Marie removes the bullet. Closing the wound, it tempts her to send an energy discharge to see if that can restart the beloved Aunt’s heart when her guide stops her from doing so. ‘She’s back,’ her met-tet announces in her mind, and frowning, Marie searches for a pulse.</p><p>Whereas there was none before, now it thrums strong under her fingers, and stable as if the witch had never lost blood… and Mambo Marie doesn’t know how that could’ve happened. Even if the redhead doesn’t awaken, the vodouisant had never seen a witch resurrect by herself before.</p><p>In another realm, Zelda is closing a door, not quite knowing why. There’s darkness on the side that was left behind, and so much light now on her back.</p><p>The redhead knows she has opened the door of her home to be shot by Ms. Wardwell. She feels the pain in her side and the warm blood seeping through her fingers. The directrix sees the sticky red liquid marrying her hands and then she turns around, blinking quickly to allow her eyes to accommodate the light.</p><p>There’s a sun shining brightly but not warmly, and grey clouds are passing through. There’s a garden she recognizes with ease. There’s a dinosaur-like bush she knows she keeps like that by hand, like a friendly pet-plant. Zelda knows she should have felt the chilly breeze or smelling the sweet aroma of petrichor. Since the soil is humid now, and she knows rain has just stopped. But she doesn’t. There aren’t birds or any other sound that comes from a realm full of life, and she gets it.</p><p>Of course, the nether realm looked like the Spellman Mortuary. When that building held both heaven and hell for Zelda Spellman. So why would her limbo be pictured as any other place? She thinks.</p><p>Hilda, she kinda expects to see there. Hoped really, since the redhead remembers killing her spider-version and burying it at Cain’s pit, and only now she reckons that it might not work. That her sister could be stuck forever in limbo, and she would be the guilty party, just as Batibat’s nightmare had foretold.</p><p>Now, Edward, she didn’t expect. Her brother smiles then, not truly accepting being her met-tet. Her brother knows her well, and by doing so, he doesn’t need to explain something she won’t even listen to. Instead, he takes her to three stages of her life, and she doesn’t quite get it. Then he asks Hilda if she could give them some space. That the next thing it’s for Zelda alone.</p><p>If this request confuses Hilda, she doesn’t really show. Instead, the youngest Spellman lets out a cheery, “Go ahead, loves. Just come back to have a quick meal before y’all are gone. Oh! Don’t forget to bring her along!” The blonde sister smiles and they nod. Edward waves his hand to allow the redhead to walk ahead and towards the entrance.</p><p>As they step away from the house, they find themselves in the middle of a wood Zelda doesn’t recognize. She has no recollection of it, but she recalls the tale behind it the moment she spots a cloaked figure lowering a basket to the ground. The redhead notices the figure placing a kiss on the chubby cheeks of her baby self. Making sure she’s all tucked in and warm, she knocks on the Spellman’s door and hides behind the tree line.</p><p>There’s a breathing moment there. Edward points her to her baby self. There’s another piece of paper, one she knows all too well. Yet, it’s the Strophalos that catches her attention.</p><p>“Do you understand now?” Edward asks. “I think I do,” Zelda nods. “There’s one more thing you must see. I’m sorry, I never should’ve pushed you to confess this one to me.” He adds. She knows exactly when he is taking her.</p><p>Zelda sees the fire and remembers exactly how it burned her. How it had pained her. Her hand finds her side, where her rib is still missing from its original place. The wound might have closed centuries ago, without ever leaving a mark. Yet the pain, the helplessness she felt will forever be attached to her bones. In the past, her head sags, and a large drop of blood falls into the fire from the cut on her side. The High Priestess remembers being grateful for that cut, it was what made her unconscious before the worst pains.</p><p>Then she sees as Madam Satan in all her demoniacal glory appears in front of her. It’s not Mary Wardwell. It’s Lilith with her green skin, dark hair, and skeletons in her eyes what she sees, yet…. Her heart skips a beat… It’s her Lily. “Wait, what is she doing here? She said she never heard my prayers….”</p><p>“She hasn’t. Lucifer heard theirs, and he sent her to check why was he summoned,” Edward explains, as they see Lilith in action. “Then why?” Zelda frowns, confused.</p><p>“That you must ask her. What I can tell you is…. Cover your ears,” Her brother tells her, and she’s confused for a second until she hears the mother of demons screech and warlocks dying from it. It’s so similar to the one the redhead leaves whenever she’s in pain that scares her to think she might have killed someone utterly unaware of the effects of it.</p><p>What worries her, though, is that, as Lucifer’s right hand, Lilith had no place saving her from the clutches of her death. Yet, that’s exactly what she sees the demoness doing. Then, she dons another glamor… One that looks almost too close to her own image that makes her frown. Even when her heart does strange somersaults inside her chest.</p><p>“That’s Lilith’s first vessel. The one she was created with. She became a brunette when she called God’s ineffable name and was cast away from Eden. You might think of it as the first hair change done after sealing a fate by walking away from the fake Lord.” Edward says.</p><p>“As it happens in the Dark baptisms?” Zelda wonders. “Exactly. Some say it's Lucifer’s way to honor her bravery, to walk away from the safety of the garden and into his side. Others say it’s God’s way to remind her that the choice was hers. That everyone’s choices are their own. I suppose we won’t know which one is true. We must return now.”</p><p>“Edward? Why are you stuck in limbo?” She asks then, as they walk through the woods and back to the mortuary. He smiles, softly. “Because I came to the world to keep you safe, Phiona, and until you are, I will be here. We both will.” He says, looking towards the entry of the house where Diana waits. “She’s here? She’s not… why?”</p><p>“I suppose we made a different deal. We were pawns in a game, Zelda. We just didn’t know which one.” He kisses her cheek. “Now, I believe there’s a warm meal waiting for us before you must get back.”</p><p>She awakens with a sharp intake of breath. Surrounded by witches they had saved, and purple candles everywhere. The place looks familiar but the last thing she remembers was her niece, her nephew, and the stairs of the mortuary.</p><p>Of course, they would bring everyone to Dorian’s. Yet, as she worries for Hilda, she has no time to dwell on the coldness of being alone in her own body. Thinking of the emptiness of not feeling Lilith’s energy and emotions grasping at the very core of her heart with every move she makes. Zelda feels bereft of her Lily… And yet, she doesn’t have time to mourn.</p><p>Not when Hilda needs her, not when she might have lost a sister and by her own hands. No, she won’t sit and cry as she did on that nightmare of hers. Now it was time to act.</p><p>“If she hasn’t resurrected on her own, then I’ll use what I learned in the next life to drag her back into this one. Today we will rip our sister Hilda back from the clutches of death himself. Now, who amongst you will return to the Spellman house with me to do the deed?” she asks. There are a couple of hands raised and before she can think of it, they are all at the Spellman Mortuary’s graveyard.</p><p>There’s no incantation or anything… there’s no sign of who did it. The one thing she knows is that no one questioned it either. Everyone is still too shocked at her resurrection. She doesn’t give them time either.</p><p>Twelve witches and herself. There’s one missing for her circle. She looks around and sees Sabrina’s friend. Rosalind.</p><p>Zelda, imposing, haughty, terrifying, and newly resurrected, Zelda Spellman walks towards the mortal girl who tries not to cower at her. Surprising everyone who knew her. The redhead smiles. “Rosalind, witches once cursed your family. Will you help one now and settle this feud once and for all?” She asks.</p><p>“You mean… I can help?” Roz wonders, looking at Sabrina’s aunt, surprised by this offer. “Aradia, once came to this Earth to teach mortals the ways of magic. You already have it in you, you already are a seer, are you not?” Zelda questions. The dumbfounded teen nods as an answer. “Then, you can partake of this casting circle. Before, I will raise the hex that has befallen into your lineage.”</p><p>“I thought… It couldn’t be done?” Roz says, looking at Sabrina. It’s Ambrose, the one who answers her, though, “It can be done. Just not by any witch. It takes greater knowledge than Sabrina has, than most of us have or will have. Auntie Zee most likely can raise it in a blink of an eye.”</p><p>“She can?” Sabrina asks, and Ambrose chuckles. “Oh, Brina, haven’t you ever noticed how Auntie Zee is always willing things through space and time? Finding a curse in a lineage is far easier than that.”</p><p>“There’s that…” Zelda says and raises Rosalind's face with a finger to inspect her. “There’s also the fact that the curse you carry is mine.” Zelda states. “An ancient one that comes from old times. I can easily raise it from your lineage. Then, I can tell you all you want to know about it after we revive my sister. If you want to help us. I will raise your curse for you and Sabrina’s friendship nonetheless.”</p><p>“So, it’s not a bargain?” Roz wonders. “It could be; however, you are here of your own free will, and yes, I’m in desperate need of a thirteenth woman to close the circle. It won’t do if I forced her in there. I can only plead with you to help me bring my sister back. To help me get Sabrina’s aunt back.”</p><p>“Count me I’m in,” Roz says. “What should I do?”</p><p>“Stand in the circle, I just need to know one of us won’t be taken aback by what I’m about to do.” Zelda grins.</p><p>“Thank you, Rosalind,” she says, grasping the girl’s face with two hands. “Will you like me to remove the cunning skills that I bestowed upon the women of your family for what one did?” She wonders.</p><p>“N-no…” Zelda smiles. With her thumbs, she closes the young mortal’s eyes and frees her from the curse she’d thrown over her lineage. Roz feels a warm current going through her as she opens her eyes. “It’s done. For all it’s worth, I’m sorry it affected you and your Nana. I can’t be sorry for the reason I cast it, to begin with.” She says and walks away towards Mambo Marie.</p><p>“I understand your magic doesn’t come from the pit. Neither did our, since his powers were celestial. However, it’s not Bondye who I will call upon. Will you stand with us as I call our mother?” Zelda asks her.</p><p>“I’ll stand with you, Cherie, to help another woman, as all women should do. We should always stand for one another, beliefs notwithstanding.”</p><p>“Thank you.” The redhead whispers. “Please, ladies, if you’ll form a circle around’s here. Where our Hilda’s rest.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0041"><h2>41. Chapter 41</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>As the casting circle closes around her, Zelda closes her eyes. Six full witches with powers untouched and seven teens, one of them a mortal seer; another one a half-mortal-Morningstar. Zelda looks around and smiles. They had walked a few hundred miles from where they had started the year, embracing hedge witches and mortal teens into their coven. She knows they are only there to empower her further, so she can channel Hecate’s gifts into the ground where her sister lies.</p><p>However, it doesn’t quite go as she thought it would. The moment she speaks, the High Priestess feels her own energies rising beyond the extent she knew she kept hidden inside. Yet, Zelda cannot stop herself now, no matter how much it scares her to let her powers out for anyone to see. For Hilda, for her heartbroken nephew and niece, the redhead settles her fears away and starts.</p><p>Unknowingly, the Directrix draws the same triple moon Pan drew to stop the coven from regaining their powers as they ate the celestial body during the Hare Moon. “We call you, Hecate,” she whispers, and winds rush, reminding her of her Dark Baptism for some unknown reason.</p><p>She calls for the maiden; she calls for the mother, and she calls for the crone. Then, out of nowhere, Zelda thinks of Lilith. The first witch. The first woman. “When we call on the three-in-one, we call on all witches stretching back from the beginning of time to the end of the days,” she adds. Zelda feels her Lily’s magic joining the energetic vortex that’s being created at her will. It’s different this time, as it doesn’t mingle with hers. It’s just part of it all, and she feels herself missing the demoness terribly.</p><p>“Return our sister Hilda to the realm of the living, and we will never forget you again!” Zelda shouts. Ambrose, who is standing to the side with all the other men who wanted to help, watches with surprise the way his Aunt is exploiting her powers in ways he has never seen her use. Finally, he understands why his Uncle Edward was so afraid of Zelda being used by Faustus Blackwood. Unleashed, Zelda Spellman is a force of nature herself, and if weaponized like Lilith had been for millennia... He shakes his head, the idea of the demoness being her aunt’s twin soul burning deeply in his mind.</p><p>Despite being a clear day, one thunder rumbles in the background, but Zelda doesn’t feel it. She hears nothing more than the energies howling around her. And… nothing happens. The winds stop, the storm never starts, there isn’t even rain… Not even a faint drizzle of hope.</p><p>Zelda breaks. She was sure, so certain that it would work. The redhead felt it in her every bone, every cell. As if she could really drag her sister from the clutches of Death.</p><p>The High Priestess lets herself fall to the ground, feeling the unworthiness, the self-loathe she’s so used to. She hears the voice of Hilda’s parents calling her all those hateful words they never kept in when directed towards her. The redhead hears a gunshot, and in her mind’s eye, she sees the way Hilda looked at her that night -half pleading, half terrified- as she cocked the rifle and shot her. Guiltiness adds to the mix.</p><p>Zelda Spellman had killed for good the only person who had never doubted of her, no matter how many times she had buried her into the same ground that now seems will be her last resting place.</p><p>She killed Hilda. Her Hildie… She might have loved Edward, considered him her older brother, her ever-present protector, but Hilda had her heart since the moment she had opened her eyes. Her little sister, the one who never judged her or her antics. The one she went through extreme lengths to protect from their own parents. The first witch who had seen her cry, who had wiped her tears away and helped her feel slightly better. She has lost her best friend, -her only true friend- and by her own hands.</p><p>A heavy tear falls to the ground, infused with all the sadness; with all the loss, with all the love… and as Zelda breaks in front of all the coven, her haughty, unmovable facade torn into billions of pieces, Hilda finally claws her way out of the pit.</p><p>Zelda will learn one day that it was that tear that brought her sister back. That tear in which she willed to see her sister, to embrace her, to walk her down the aisle to that pathetic mortal Hilda loved so damn much. Yet, now… Now, she is more worried about helping her out and finding a cigarette. To hide under a broken facade and regain a composure she knows will never be the same in front of anyone who had seen her flailing.</p><p>She’s surprised to find that Sabrina has come up with a half-decent plan to stop the pagans. “I’m loathed to say this, and don’t get too used to this, Sabrina, but you might have a good plan there," Zelda says.</p><p>“So, you are on board?” Sabrina asks surprised, blushing under her Aunt’s praise. “Yes, but after a shower. I can’t stand the smell of my blood and I love this blouse. I still owe you, Rosalind, the explanations you might want. Spellmans, you should be all present when I do this.” Zelda states, rushing to the house where she will cry in gratitude while she showers.</p><p>“Yes, love. I could use a bath too,” Hilda grins, but her sister is already inside the house. “I guess some things will never change,” Sabrina smiles at her redhead aunt’s actions.</p><p>“Ambrose, Sabrina, will you be a dear and show them to the biscuits and treats we have inside as we clean up? Maybe add some wards to the parlor so everyone else doesn’t fall asleep when we sing?”</p><p>“Will do, Auntie.” He grins, pecking her cheek, feeling relieved to see her in one piece. “Oh, and what are these explanations she might owe to your friend?” Hilda asks as they walk towards the house. “Ah, she might have cursed Ros’s family at some point.” The teen lets out with a smile.</p><p>“Don’t worry, Ms. Spellman, Ms. Spellman already lifted the curse from my lineage.” Ros grins.</p><p>“The things one misses when dead…” Hilda mutters, shaking her head.</p><p>It’s barely half an hour later. The coven has returned to the academy where they are warding themselves from the sleeping incantation that will fall upon Greendale while waiting for the signal to attack the carnival.</p><p>At the Spellman mortuary, the usual members of the household are sitting at the parlor. Added to the mix, there are Sabrina’s mortal friends. There was no point in getting rid of them. They would learn whatever Zelda told Rosalind, anyway.</p><p>So, the haughty redhead turns a cigarette on, takes a deep drag, and rubs the place where her rib is missing. It’s not the one she must tell, but it aches similarly. “Let’s start from the reason that led to your family curse.” She says. “As you know, there are four witches that summoned hellfire,” the Directrix adds, looking towards her family.</p><p>“Aradia, Lilith, the unknown witch, and me,” Sabrina says with a bright smile. “Yes, and no, niece,” Zelda crooks her head. “That’d be Aradia, Lilith, me, and you… Sabrina.”</p><p>“You are the unknown witch?” Hilda frowns. “But… She helped mortals!” Zelda raises an eyebrow at this. “And why do you think I hate them, well, most of them, with passion?” She says, sparing a half glance to the mortals and half-mortal around them. “I helped them, and in gratitude, they tied me to a blessed stake! Trying to burn me as a witch,” the redhead sneers. Not giving her family time to question, she continues, “I escaped it, obviously, but I cursed the entire village before I did. Your ancestors were part of said place, Rosalind. I erased their memories of my name and the finer details of my face. So, they wouldn’t know me even if I was in front of them.”</p><p>“Now, your ancestor… I know exactly who she was because I considered her a friend. Yes, Sabrina, I used to have mortal friends too,” the High Priestess adds rolling her eyes before her niece can interject. “She was a delightful creature, always so curious. Questioning me, wanting to learn whatever she could,” Zelda smiles.</p><p>“Following Aradia’s steps, I taught her the secrets of herbs. Yet, she was the first one to turn onto me. She described the things she saw. How I created concoctions that healed them and helped them in exchange for whatever they could give me. How I helped the women to birth, and no child I brought to this world had fallen prey to premature death.”</p><p>“That sounds kinda cool, that you helped them…” Harvey says. Zelda’s lips curl upwards slightly. “Until they added it to the claims of what they saw when I summoned Hellfire and sentenced me to burn.” She says taking another drag. “I understand your ancestor wasn’t the sole responsible for my almost demise. The greater traitor paid with his life. However, hers was one of the most painful betrayals I experienced that day. I cursed her and her lineage to lose their sight, but not before they experienced the world. So, they would know exactly what they’ve missed.”</p><p>“A bit extreme, isn’t it?” Theo wonders. The witches around them chuckle. “Usually we pay blood with blood,” Ambrose smiles. “So, I’ll say their punishment was light.”</p><p>“And the cunning? You said you bestowed it upon them…” Ros frowns.</p><p>“Ah, haven’t you experienced the effects of it on your own flesh, Rosalind? Haven’t you heard people calling you names and mocking you when you had one?” The girl nods. “Times are different, people won’t burn you for being different. Yet, back then… They would. That’s the reason your ancestors traveled to Greendale. To escape their fates. However, the real motive behind it was that I wanted her to understand what it was like to be different. To be frowned upon the moment someone discovers you are a rarity. I wanted her to pay… and so I made them all pay.”</p><p>“I understand. It’s… terrifying that you can do that, Ms. Spellman. Yet, I understand.” Zelda takes another drag and nods. “Good. I’m sorry I never freed your Nana Ruth. She was, like you, a kind, understanding woman.”</p><p>“You knew her?” Sabrina frowns. “Why, of course... I have followed the Walker’s steps closely. For her cunning, Ruth knew who I was. She never gave me away or asked me to restore her sight. She was worried about you, Rosalind. Ruth thought you were a strong woman. She said the cunning showed her that when the time came, I would free you from it myself. That’s all. Do you have any doubts?”</p><p>“What’s hellfire? Isn’t Lilith the one that looks like Ms. Wardwell? Who is Aradia?” Are some of the questions the High Priestess understands from the several three mortal teens ask in quick succession. Laughter bubbles out of Zelda, surprising her family members with it. “Perhaps Sabrina can answer some of those for you when the Apocalypse isn’t at our doorstep? Now, please remain in here as we do what we must.” Zelda instructs as she summons Prudence.</p><p>“Zelds? Are you sure you are… You?” Hilda frowns as they walk towards the kitchen where Ambrose already had settled everything for their work. “You seem a bit… odd.”</p><p>“Who else could I be? Don’t worry, Hildie. I’m just being truly me with no so many barriers,” she says.</p><p>The High Priestess wants to tell her she’s never been better, but that’s a blunt lie. Zelda remembers vividly, lying in Lilith’s arms, basking in their afterglow, feeling loved and loving her without words. Hilda observes her, she can see there’s a lightness in her sister as if someone had lifted some weight from her shoulders. Yet, there’s also an immense sadness the blonde has no idea where it could come from. Despite her warmer ways, there’s also an emptiness in Zelda’s entire demeanor that was never there before. ‘Or that I hadn’t spotted before,’ Hilda thinks.</p><p>Once Sabrina has found the woman who had shot her Aunt, she keeps her bound and erases her memory from ever knowing they are witches. Then they attack. The High Priestess allows the coven to get the blood they were craving. Several witches will dine pagan meat tonight. Of that, Zelda is sure.</p><p>She turns to her side where her sister is standing as if hesitating about her next steps. There’s a poppet in her hands. Zelda remembers Hilda telling her she believed the pagans had done something to her, and Sabrina mentioning how Circe had changed Ross, Dorcas, and some mortal boys back to their human forms.</p><p>“Will you need company, sister?” She asks then. The blonde shakes her head no. Hilda Spellman might be soft, and bubbly… but she loves dearly, and Circe had robbed her from her Dr. Cee. Forced her to kill him without any qualms or will. Zelda truly understands her need to do this alone.</p><p>She takes Ambrose then, and they find Prudence for backstabbing support. In case Pan tries to enthrall them with his maddening eyes. A sword goes through him before he falls to his knees. “Why you serve him? If you are one of us?” He asks looking at Zelda.</p><p>“I could never be one of yours, and I do not serve him.” She states he looks at her. “You found your mother, then,” Pan whispers, his eyes getting glazier by the second. “Yet you still don’t…” He never finishes it, letting her wonder what he meant.</p><p>They save the day, and that includes ‘that spinster schoolmarm that had shot her,’ Zelda thinks. Yet, there’s no sign of Lilith. She feels disappointed. Especially when she learns Sabrina is the Queen of Hell. That Lucifer is there, free of Blackwood, and that Lilith is alive because she’s pregnant with her master’s child. “Seems I keep getting more family I never knew I wanted,” the teen adds as she tells them this.</p><p>And Zelda can’t help but drown herself in alcohol to keep her foolish heart at bay. The redhead can’t shake the feeling that this emptiness, this heartbreaking void that leaves her breathless despite having just saved the world, is what mortals would describe as Hell.</p><p>She cannot feel Lilith’s despair and shame, as she readies Sabrina for the position that was promised to her. The High Priestess cannot feel the brunette’s sadness and heartbreak of thinking her gone. The redhead doesn’t know that whenever she can, the demoness’s hand is placed over her belly, and vows to protect the child Zelda won’t get to raise.</p><p>No, Zelda shakes herself off darker thoughts of another being, abandoning her for whatever reason. She vows to survive this emptiness no matter what. Yet, she can’t quite close her emotions away as her sister fills the house with such sadness. When Hilda is mourning for losing the one being, not related to her family, who had loved her back. Exchanging a glance with Ambrose, Zelda disappears in favor of the academy, to let Hilda mourn her loss. She trusts her sister will have Ambrose, who was more like a son than a nephew to Hilda, as a source of whatever comfort one could offer to someone whose heart has broken many times, but only once like this. Only once because she was loved back this time.</p><p>At the academy, the news of having found Dorcas slaughtered waits for her. They have no idea when has Agatha has killed her sister, and as there’s no trace of her soul at the nether realm, there’s no coming back for the child.</p><p>Zelda squares her shoulders. The work she must do, the responsibility she now carries heavily over her shoulders, weights more than she thought it would. Especially when there’s no one there to share it with. It’s only in the few moments the redhead had shared with Lilith had she ever shared any kind of burden. So she shakes herself. She knows she can do it. The High Priestess of Hecate knows she can tackle this issue and come out of it, not unscathed, but standing.</p><p>There’s a lot of work to be done. The coven isn’t fully replenished, but they will be. The redhead knows this somehow. She knows by the time they bask into the moonlight things will get back to whatever kind of normal they now have.</p><p>The High Priestess walks into her office, in a search for the bitter taste of scotch burning down her throat. She finds Mambo Marie instead. “You were dead… and resurrected. I never saw or heard of a witch rebirthing by their own means.”</p><p>“Sabrina did…” Zelda shrugs, walking to pour some alcohol, and downs one glass before she serves them both a glass each. Marie shakes her head, but takes the glass, nonetheless. “Your niece is Lucifer’s daughter, his prophesied sword, Zelda Spellman. There’s an explanation for it. Now, yours…. Is nothing if not miraculous.”</p><p>“Far from it,” she waves dismissively, and there’s a thought lingering in her mind. Zelda wants to taste the lips that were flirting with her since they met. She listens to the voodooist, her mind paying half-attention to her words until she brings her close and kisses her.</p><p>There’s no explosion of colors around her. No sweet songs are being played in the background. There’s no thrumming underneath her skin telling exactly how the other woman feels about this kiss. Yet, lips are searching hers, and she finds her tongue requesting entry to the secrets that lie hidden inside Marie’s mouth.</p><p>She’s not Lilith by far. However, she chooses it. Zelda chooses her, and it feels not quite as right as she thought it would. It feels like she is settling and be she any other witch that would be enough. But she isn’t. The redhead stops, breaking their kiss and resting her forehead on Marie’s.</p><p>Zelda can’t help to notice the enthralling contrast of their skins and how different it is from Lilith’s. How everything could be perfect, yet it’s nothing short of bittersweet. Whereas her relationship with Lily was nothing but imperfect, and yet, complementing and rewarding. </p><p>She has Marie available and willing, but she longs for her Lily, in all closed off and fearful wildness glory. In that shared understanding of just how much they understand each other and yet know nothing and a lot about the other. “I’m sorry. I can’t,” the Directrix whispers, and a dark hand finds her cheek where a tear has gotten loose. Wiping it, Marie pecks her lips.</p><p>“You want her. Your heart longs for the witch you have forsaken.” She states without judgment. “I hoped you would, even if it pains me, Zelda Spellman. They made you for so much more than me. They made you for so much more than you give yourself credit for,” the vodouisant kisses her once more. “I’m here if you want comfort. I’m here if you want to share your thoughts. I’m here if you want to share your bed. I’m here, for you. I’ll remain here for you, in whatever capacity you need me.”</p><p>Lovers, the High Priestess had had plenty. All offering her the lust and taking her as a sex doll. A powerful witch to charm and try to bend to their wills. However, until Lilith, never has Zelda be on the other end of kind words from a potential partner. No matter how the redhead knows this relationship could break the witch in front of her, Zelda knows she could take it all -she would’ve taken it all- hadn’t she felt Lilith’s love. “I can’t offer you what you want, Marie. Not in the slightest.”</p><p>“I’m not asking you to. I know how this will end, Zelda. It ends on my heartbreaking, but with memories that will hold me for the years to come. Not all of us are as lucky to have found our twin souls. Some of us just get to love people destined to someone else. Hoping that there would be a light at the end of the tunnel that will fuse all the parts we have broken along the way.”</p><p>“I…” Zelda tries. But Marie places a finger over her lips. “I just want to hold you for a night. I know we both need some human comfort.” Marie says caressing the redhead’s cheek. The High Priestess can’t help but remember the betrayal of Lilith’s mating before her own death, and Sabrina’s words. ‘Can you believe I’ll have a half-brother? From Lilith... After all we did to help her dethrone my father?’ So she nods.</p><p>“One night.”</p>
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<a name="section0042"><h2>42. Chapter 42</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Well, I'm not quite sure if I like the Lilith portion of this chapter... I tried to rewrite it but it didn't happen xD<br/>So here you have it to like or dislike of your own free will, I guess...</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When Zelda awakes the next day, she does it late and to a previously unknown bed. It’s not her bed at the Academy, not her bed in her room. Neither her bed in that cottage where she only ever took Lilith with her. No, it’s one in a room at the Academy assigned to Mambo Marie.</p><p>After defeating the pagans, and their help with Hilda, the professor’s rooms at the academy had been given away to the elderly witches as a show of gratitude.</p><p>Sighing in content, the redhead stretches against raspy sheets that tickle her skin, touching the side where a warm body should be. It’s cold, and for a moment, Zelda doesn’t quite know if she feels distressed or relieved.</p><p>After agreeing to the one night, Marie had linked their hands and helped her up, kissing her thoroughly when she stood. “There’s still plenty to do before that happens, Marie. I need to dine with my family before I can return to check up on the students and fulfill your request.” Zelda says. “I understand, Cherie.” She pecks the cheek. “I’ll wait for you until your return, then.”</p><p>So Zelda went home. Found out that Hilda’s mate was alive. How now the brokenhearted one was Ambrose, and surprisingly, that Sabrina was back from Hell in time for dinner. It was all was too much, too fast. Even when she wanted to crawl into her own bed and cry her heart out. The redhead had excused herself to the Academy because she had a promise to keep.</p><p>Marie was at the library, her nose deep in one tome when Zelda cleared her throat. “You are back,” the younger witch said, dazzled by her return. The redhead smiled, “I’m true to my words,” she shrugged. Marie stood tall and rounded the table she was using before, coming to stand right in front of the High Priestess. Smiling brightly, once again she offered her hand.</p><p>With a little apprehension, the Directrix took it and they walked like that through several rooms, letting go, only when they stopped so the High Priestess could check on the children. Zelda smiled at seeing Sycorax and Pesta answering awkwardly the questions about their gifts. She knew neither had been under the spotlight like this before.</p><p>“You might have saved the world from Apocalypse, children. However, the school still is in session tomorrow,” she lets out. “Sycorax, Pesta… I take you can continue this conversation during class?” She offered and the previous hedge witches nodded. “Great, then bedtime now.”</p><p>Complaints and groans were coming from the kids and the witches. Zelda couldn’t help but smile at this. It reminded her of home. Of those days of fighting with Sabrina when the kid was too overexcited to sleep. It brought some bittersweet memories of moments that were long gone and will be forever missed now, especially with Sabrina popping in and out of Hell.</p><p>The lump in her throat grew. Since her niece could get in and out yet her love… had made not one appearance. ‘Perhaps she’s ashamed of facing you after what she did, after what happened,’ her mind provided her. ‘Besides, it’s what? A day after we departed, and you are already willing to forget her? Already hopped into the next available bed. What could you complain about?’</p><p>Marie's knowing eyes landed on her and at that time, was Zelda the one offering her hand, before they continued the way to the voodoo witch’s room. Looking at the bed, she wondered for a second if laying into this bed would be worse of treason than the betrayal she felt from Lilith while she died.</p><p>With a snap of her fingers, the redhead did something she rarely used magic for. She changed into her silky black and plain nightgown with a blue robe tied tightly around her waist. For a second, she questioned why she felt safer magically changing herself instead of doing it by hand as she so much preferred.</p><p>Maybe she was changing too, feeling freer to use the extent of her powers instead of fearful of what would come of her if anyone found out. Yet, her mind went to the moments shared with Lilith. How Lily had kept an amused grin as she observed Zelda change, waiting patiently, following every move until the redhead finished her handy process. As for how vulnerable, her nightly preparation made her feel. How truer her nightly routine would present her in front of this witch she knows nothing about. Yet she is curious about enough to spend the night with.</p><p>“Where’s your mind at, Cherie?” Marie questioned standing behind her. By then, she was also clad in a nightgown. Her hand found purchase loosely around Zelda’s waist. Her head softly lowered over silk-covered shoulders. Her gazes locked for a brief second through the mirror that was placed in a corner where Zelda’s eyes fell on the moment she felt the not so warm hands at her waist.</p><p>No, definitively this bewitching woman wasn’t her Lily.</p><p>There was sadness, emptiness, and so much more hiding in those green pools that forced Marie to take a deep breath and look away. Zelda was comparing, and it hurt her. Yet, the redhead had been honest and was also in her arms. “Her. You are thinking about her.”</p><p>“I’m sorry, Marie,” she whispered truthfully and turning around in her embrace. The Spellman witch's hands fell onto the voodooist’s almost naked shoulders. “It’s too new and too raw…” She confessed, surprising herself. “I am too new and too raw. I feel I’ve changed in the few hours I’ve been gone. As if I still need to find my footing as to who I am now.”</p><p>“You are Zelda Spellman,” Marie stated without a doubt, and Zelda gulped. There were two things clear in that sentence for the redhead. She is not a Spellman, and her name was missing in there. Yet, she nodded, agreeing instead of confessing her truth as she had with Lilith. “Shall we?” She asks instead, not ready to tackle that subject or any other subject then.</p><p>If Mambo Marie read the Directrix’s hesitation at her answer, she doesn’t question her, and at least that was a relief. Soon, the High Priestess lay beside the taller woman, and yet, Marie's back was turned to her, waiting for Zelda to spoon close.</p><p>Fighting a tear, Zelda moved in to tug the woman into her arms. Yes, Marie is no Lilith, that’s clear. Her Lily would’ve remained facing her, their breaths intermingling, their limbs tangled. Her Lily would’ve known Zelda needed to be the held like equals as her entire world was collapsing around her, walls enclosing her, taking her breath away. But Marie doesn’t. Despite the fact that the redhead feels like the woman could be closer to her than any other witch in years, Zelda is torn by how Marie, who seemed to get her, doesn’t know her at all.</p><p>Zelda gulps and adds Marie to the list of people who (unconsciously) hope to be protected by her, even when she is the most broken of them all. For a terrifying self-doubt moment, Zelda wondered if that was how Lilith felt about her too.</p><p>Despite feeling a ripple most of the night, it’s during the devil’s hour when Zelda felt the call of the cosmos, the warning her that, as Marie had announced, something horrible was coming for them.</p><p>She tossed and turned then, in a futile attempt to fall asleep while trying not to wake the other woman up. Finally, she found herself padding in her nightgown through empty corridors towards the kitchen, brewing a sleeping concoction -one she knew by heart for the exaggerated amount of use she’s given to it throughout the years- and brought it back to the room. Drinking it, she finally fell into a deep sleep.</p><p>Now, as she lay on the cold raspy bed, she can’t help to think about the mornings spent with Lilith. They were few and far in between most of the times, yet the demoness was always there when she woke up. As if sensing she would feel this bout of abandonment had she not found her there.</p><p>Suckling her lower lip to bite down a crying fit that she won’t allow herself to begin, Zelda remembers one day when she woke up in -back then- Mary’s bed to find herself alone. How she couldn’t avoid the tears filling her eyes and the sense of emptiness that had threatened to drown her. Then she heard movement inside the ensuite bathroom, realizing how foolish she was. Yet, she hadn’t composed herself before Lilith had entered the room.</p><p>She remembers vividly, the way the demoness had looked at her. Not with pity, but with so much tenderness as she rushed to her side and held her close. “I’m sorry, but I really needed to pee,” she had explained quickly, once the redhead had calmed down in her arms. How well had the mother of demons come to know her even when she didn’t know the Spellman matriarch at all.</p><p>Shaking herself of her mood, Zelda teleports herself back to the Spellman Mortuary, searching for a shower in which she will be free to cry her heart out and gather her armor around her until she finds the time to deal with it all. Even if she knows by this looming feeling that keeps tugging at her powers that she might not have it at all.</p><p>During all this, in Hell, Lilith learned the meaning mortals had bestowed upon those four silly letters. She must endure not only the way Sabrina is treating her-like an entitled little brat- so different from the way the teen had treated her when she was her favorite teacher.</p><p>There’s something off in this Sabrina, too. Lilith would’ve expected for her to at least be a little sad to have lost her strict Auntie. She was one of the mothers the teen didn’t have. Yet, there she was, Sabrina Morningstar, cheeringly dancing with the annoying clay boy. Having forgotten all about the devilishly handsome warlock who had sacrificed himself for her, and Lilith had seen her pout about. Having forgotten everything about the family that loves her, and she claimed to love.</p><p>To make things worse, they cast the demoness to the side until it’s time for her to drag the power-drunken (and alcohol wasted) teen to her room. As if she’s nothing more than a disposable servant. Lilith snorts at this thought. That is exactly her place in the utter mess. She is a disposable servant with an expiring date closing over her with every breath she took. It reminds her of those days where Zelda feared for Constance Blackwood's pregnancy ending.</p><p>Still, she helps the little brat out of her hard-infernal gown. That looks quite ridiculous. No one asked her about style, and she wasn’t about to tell Lucifer -who has just barely spared her life- that he had an awful taste in clothes. Then rolls her eyes as Sabrina's face plants herself over the bed, clad only in her underwear.</p><p>“When did I become Hell’s nanny?” The former Queen of Hell mumbles as she helps the child under the sheets and leaves towards her own room.</p><p>Dropping herself on her empty bed, Lilith places a hand over her belly. She prays to someone, anyone, to help her out of this mess. It had never worked before. Why would anyone answer her now? “Well, at least, everyone else has forgotten how chaotic the realms still are. Too focused on drinking themselves silly.” She thinks, but the demoness had felt the ripple in the balance the whole damn night and the tug of the cosmos urging her to step up and take action. To fulfill the prophecy that can’t be fulfilled because her twin soul was shot to death.</p><p>Something is nagging at the back of her head, but truly she’s too tired to care about it. She’s too overwhelmed by everything that this day -was it only a day?- has brought upon her.</p><p>Lilith feels the need to transport herself and check upon the other Spellmans, to see if any of them know the pain she’s in. If any of them miss Zelda in the way she did. They had to! They knew her for far longer! And if someone of the likes of Zelda Spellman doesn’t get her own family to love her and mourn for losing her… What hopes does the demoness has as to be ever remembered as something more than the myths that were created around her name?</p><p>She doesn’t know quite how, but her lids feel heavy and somehow, she sleeps. Everything is black around her, and in front of her, there’s a crossroad. A cloaked figure stands in the middle of it. A key in her hand and torches lighting the surrounding darkness with an amber glow.</p><p>“Lilitu! Finally,” a voice in her head -she can’t feel her body, but she knows the voice is in her head- tells her in that way no one has called her since the Garden, bringing chills down her spine. “Who are you?” Lilith asks.</p><p>“You know who I am. Most importantly, you know who I am not.” The voice says. “Hecate?” Lilith tries, and the voice chuckles. “It’s one of my many names, yes.”</p><p>“Why am I here?” Lilith asks again, and there’s another bout of laughter. In the darkness, she sees the garden in a way she has never seen it before. As she is a ghost flying across it. She can see it all, including herself and Adam, from nothing to Eve’s creation.</p><p>“<em>And he made them in their likeness, male and female he created them. But something went wrong.</em>” The voice says, Lilith knows it’s the same one that spoke before, but feels as if it’s younger and eternal. “<em>You tried to create her in my like, bestowed upon her the powers of the moon. Yet, she’s not in my likeness but yours,</em>” the Goddess stated. “<em>She’s incomplete</em>,” then added, chastising him.</p><p>“<em>She is not incomplete</em>!” a second voice exclaimed. The demoness recognized it; she had called it by his ineffable name. “<em>She has Adam,</em>” her creator added.</p><p>“<em>Like I, have you? As you have me?</em>” the Goddess wondered, feeling outraged. “<em>Are you so blind that you cannot see what you’ve done?</em>” she growled.</p><p>“<em>What I’ve done? I created them for you! That’s what I’ve done.</em>” God said. The goddess chuckled.</p><p>“<em>For me? As if I needed a pet? To what? Please me out of our last difference? When you refused to talk to me about it? So, instead, you went and created them without telling me? I appreciate your gift, your creation. Now, you are blaming her for what you’ve done. She isn’t me. She is you… You’ve wanted to create order and did nothing but create chaos.</em>” The goddess chastised him. “<em>Fix it</em>.”</p><p><em>“I can’t, and you know this</em>,<em>”</em> God said, and the Goddess chuckled. <em>“Have you now learned your lesson?”</em> She asked. <em>“You balance me, I balance you. That’s why we need to work together. I know this. I just had a lapse of memory.”</em></p><p><em>“Well, it seems you have passed these lapses onto your creation. You made them, after all, at your own likeness.”</em> The Goddess said, and Lilith felt an overwhelming love surrounding everything. So strong, that she even had trouble breathing. The images ceased, and darkness took over.</p><p>“There’s a reason why the realms remained in chaos after you created the so-called Book of the Beast. When he made you in my like, he made you the stabilizing force, for it is I who balance him. Yet, he made you incomplete, since I cannot be without him and he cannot be without me. The moment you surrendered your soul, you gave our fallen angel your God-given powers. Attached them to that book, Lilitu. He is nothing without it. He is nothing without you. Lucifer knows this, he knew it before we flew away from our flock. He knew exactly where to fall and what to tell you. Because sometimes God is too predictable in his own unpredictability.”</p><p>“You are saying God isn’t all-knowing?” Lilith frowned. The voice laughed. “Oh, yes. He is all-knowing. He can be blind sometimes. That’s why we get along so perfectly. We fight, we anger each other, yet we are perfect complements. He sees what I don’t and I see what he doesn’t. That’s why someone of my own making was needed to restore the mess you created when you made Lucifer the King of Hell.”</p><p>“I tried to take Hell back, and I failed,” Lilith pouted. She felt a wind caressing her cheek as if it was a motherly kiss. Something Lilith had never felt before since they created her without a mother. “Oh, child. The new Morningstar shall rule Hell until you restore balance. Then, you might realize that Hell doesn’t quite exist. You’ll figure out you’ve created it.”</p><p>“I created it?” Lilith wonders. Another chuckle. “Well, it certainly wasn’t his creation or mine.”</p><p>“How can I change anything? When I can barely change my own life? When I can barely keep myself alive?” The demoness asked, feeling helpless. “Haven’t you survived until now? Besides, he won’t kill you. He can’t kill you without losing everything he has. Why do you think he has kept you on such a short leash until now? The fallen angel could’ve killed you millennia ago.”</p><p>“Why haven’t you come to me sooner?” She complained then. There was a sad sigh that shook Lilith to the core. “You weren’t mine. I couldn’t help you because you weren’t my child, and I swore I wouldn’t touch one of his creations, no matter how much I wanted to, how much it pained me not to. Not when the only thing he made right was to give you free will.”</p><p>“Free will? How could I choose any differently?” She whispers angrily, tears falling down her face. “Yet, you chose to call his name, you chose to leave his garden. You chose to give the same you negated Adam to another being. You, child, ran away because you wanted an equal he didn’t create. Yet, you bowed down for an ever-worse inequality, until you couldn’t remember what was that you wanted anymore. Now, it’s time for you to choose again. Now, my child has inadvertently given me a chance for this to happen. Your memory won’t remember this happening, your soul will. Your instincts were always good, Lilitu. You always knew he wasn’t good enough for you, and you knew my child was the one you were searching for.”</p><p>“I don’t understand. Why now? Why are you even contacting me? I’m still not your creation, and here I am.” Lilith could’ve sworn she saw the voice smile at her in the darkness. “Yes…<em> You</em> are not…” she said, and a wind caressed her belly. “I’ve done what I could. The rest is in both of your hands, and for that, I have granted you your free will back. Each of you can make your own choices without feeling the pressure of the other one. If you both choose so, you will be one again, as it always should’ve been. Wake up now, child.”</p><p>Lilith woke up then, feeling rested and confused. Wondering what the heavens had happened in her dream. Because she couldn’t for the life of hers remember anything at all about it. Yet, she knew she had dreamt. Rubbing her face, she fought a wave of nausea. Her name was called then, and she had rushed to where it came from. Sabrina’s room. The child wanted a bath and of course, it was now her job to get it ready. As she washed the child’s hair, she fought the need to drown her.</p><p>‘Zelda would never forgive you if you do,’ her mind said. “Zelda is dead,” she groused without noticing. “What?!” Sabrina asked, jumping in the tub to look at her. “How? I… She was alive when I left her.” The teen says, even if she hadn’t exactly seen her Auntie back on her own feet, but the other Sabrina had told her both their Aunts were alive. That she shouldn’t worry about them, since they were both unharmed.</p><p>“She was alive?” Lilith frowns. Confused as to why Zelda’s magic was no longer bound to hers anymore if she wasn’t gone. “Yes,” the teen answers a bit dubiously and looks at the demoness in a way that reminds her of those days in Greendale. “I need to check up on them.”</p><p>“Well, you certainly could. You are the Queen of Hell; you should be able to come and go as you please. Unlike me, since your father has me bound to the castle as if I’m nothing but a pet to him.” She huffs angrily. She can barely mask the pain she feels about it in her ire. It’s even crueler to know that she was nothing after so many millennia lost serving him, giving everything for him.</p><p>“I can set you free, Lilith. But you must return soon. I’m sure I can convince him I needed you to check upon my aunties.” Sabrina smiles. The teen doesn’t quite know why she wants the demoness visiting her family. But something tells her that’s the right thing to do. Well, something and the fact that another Sabrina is traipsing the mortal realm and they don’t really know what it could cause if they both share the same realm for long.</p><p>“I will return, Sabrina. Hopefully, as a bearer of good news.” </p><p>“Then I free you, Lilith, from the binding spell that keeps you attached to this castle.” They both frown as something shifts in the balance of the cosmos. As if it’s a little bit closer to equilibrium, but not quite enough. “</p><p>“You said that by claiming Hell, the balance of the cosmos would be restored.” Sabrina squints at her. “That’s what I was told, too.” Lilith answers. “Yet, seems it’s not only that what we need. I’ll check some books when I return.” The demoness said and disappeared from the room.</p>
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<a name="section0043"><h2>43. Chapter 43</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Whew! I made it... We are so, so close. I think... I hope...</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first thing Lilith does when she is back in the mortal realm is to take a deep breath. She’s used to the excessive -and now oppressive- heat of Hell. The demoness feels the need to inhale the freshness out of Greendale’s woods. For some reason, it tastes a lot like freedom, even if she knows she is anything but free. The second thing is searching for Zelda’s magical trace.</p><p>It’s not surprising for her when she appears inside the Academy’s walls. It’s shocking to see not only her love alive but standing a tad too close to the woman who had presented her the family book of predictions, ‘Marie’ her mind hisses, and her eyes shine with hellfire. They look too cozy and she can’t help to clear her throat. Even when Zelda was already scrambling to get away from the woman at the very moment she had felt Lilith’s magic in the room.</p><p>“Lilith,” Zelda whispers, eyes widened in shock and surprise. “What are you doing here? How are you here?”</p><p>“Do you mind?” The demoness asks, her icy blue eyes directed towards dark ones, eyebrow sharply raised in a veiled menace. Even then, the voodoo witch dares to stand in front of her Zelda. “You must kill me to hurt her.” Marie spits out, feeling the dangerous energy that’s coming out from the former Queen of Hell.</p><p>“Hurt her? I thought you understood,” Lilith snorts. Then waves dismissively, “please, as if I would hurt Hecate’s High Priestess. I just came here to find my book,” the demoness adds nonchalantly, walking towards where she knows she has transported it. Frowning when she finds the drawer empty.</p><p>“Your book?” Zelda lets out, trying to hide the hint of pain and disappointment in her voice. Marie doesn’t notice, but Lilith… for Lily it’s crystal clear. “Well, yes. I recall you kicking me out of here before. I know when I overstayed my welcome. I only sent it here to protect it from Lucifer,” she adds.</p><p>The demoness doesn’t hide the hurt, even if they have spoken about it. Zelda squints at her. She knows the first witch is trying to make her angry so it would force her to send Marie away. But the redhead is exhausted from being overwhelmed by everything. Instead, she pinches the bridge of her nose and walks to the alcohol cabinet, and downs a glass of bitter scotch before she turns around again.</p><p>“Marie, please, leave us. She won’t hurt me, Cherie,” Zelda states. To Lilith’s dismay, she can feel the redhead’s walls growing rapidly around her with every step that brings the witch closer to where she is standing. Her unbreachable armor of coldness in place for whatever this will entail. The demoness sees angriness bubbling underneath green eyes and can’t help but wince, preparing herself for a slap that doesn’t come as her Zelda stands a breath away from her. Instead, she feels warm lips colliding with hers, making her forget all thoughts and concerns.</p><p>Zelda doesn’t quite know what had gotten into her to kiss Lilith like that. When her office door is still open. When anyone could join them at any moment. Yet, she can’t bring herself to regret it. There might not be Lilith’s energy pumping underneath her skin, but the redhead can still feel the warm fuzzy feelings of her own, burning deep inside her as eternal embers. Quite so different from any kiss she had received before from other people.</p><p>Foreheads rest together as they stop to breathe. “You died.” Lilith whispers, it’s filled with pain and sadness. A heartbreak that Zelda feels in her core. “You dared to die on me!” The demoness grouses, punching feebly at the redhead’s chest. “I wasn’t even around to hold you, and you died! You left me alone….” Lilith mumbles, tears falling thick and rapidly from pained blue eyes.</p><p>Zelda’s hands tangle in dark locks, bringing the first witch closer as she wrecks in her arms. With a single thought, the Directrix sends her office door closed, and locks it, keeping any unwanted attention out of the room. </p><p>The demoness cries silently in her arms, as she pats her hair and back. There’s nothing Zelda can do to comfort her but being there, alive. Lilith’s hand searches for her chest, where her heart beats strong and steady, while her other hand clutches her hips tightly. Zelda knows there will be bruises on her skin, but she cannot bring herself to care. What can she say at the devastation she had unknowingly caused? What else could she do if not hold her? The redhead walks them to a chair, and soon she has her Lily wrapped on top of her, mourning what she hasn’t lost but allowing herself to feel what she couldn’t before.</p><p>It’s not until her lithe frame stops shaking and teary, puffy, red eyes reach up to lock eyes with green ones, and delicate thumbs caress away the trails of tears when the High Priestess discovers that she too had been crying. “I’m sorry, Lily. I can’t promise you I won’t die again,” Zelda chuckles tearily. “But I’m here now. We brought Hilda back too.”</p><p>“Hilda? What the heavens happened here? Witch hunters?” The demoness enquires. She hadn’t known the younger sister too had been dead. “No, I had to kill her. It’s a long story that almost got the wrong ending. But who cares about me? What happened to you? Sabrina said…” Lilith kisses her.</p><p>“Don’t say that… I care,” the demoness states. “I will always care about you. I told Sabrina I would find out how her Aunties were doing.”</p><p>Zelda frowns at this. “My niece knows exactly how we are doing; she saw us this very morning at breakfast.” She says, but there’s a look of confusion on Lilith’s face. “Oh, no… what has she done now?”</p><p>“I’m not so sure myself. All I can tell you is that Sabrina Morningstar is Queen of Hell, reigning alongside her father. They had their coronation last night. I am <em>her</em> handmaiden now…” She’s about to add until the day our child it’s out and Lucifer kills me. But Zelda interrupts her first.</p><p>“That cannot be, Sabrina was in Hell for a couple of hours at the most. She went there after we defeated the pagans and returned for dinner.” Zelda shuffles in place. Lilith knows the witch wants to pace the room. So, she untangles herself from the High Priestess, already missing the warmth she brought to her old bones even if not as before when their link wasn't cut.</p><p>The redhead stands up, feeling butterflies at how she didn’t need words, (and she can’t blame the bond either) for Lilith to understand what she wanted. She walks to the desk and turns around a mirror. The demoness pupils dilate as the redhead sucks her finger before drawing a casting circle around its frame. As sure as there’s a sun out there, there’s Sabrina in her classroom with her mortal friends.</p><p>“There was something rather odd about the Sabrina I have to care for in hell,” Lilith says as she stands behind the Directrix. Using the same mirror and trick, the mother of demons points it to Sabrina’s Queen's quarters in Hell, where the girl is at.</p><p>“What in Hecate’s name?” Zelda frowns. The ripple they felt at some point during the night making perfect sense now. Still, not the tugging claiming them to act before it’s too late.  “Ambrose,” the redhead mutters, and without being aware of its summoning effect, she finds her nephew in the room. “Auntie Zee? Lilith?”</p><p>“Ambrose, do you happen to know something about two Sabrinas?” Lilith asks since Zelda seems too astounded by his presence to do it herself. “I… yes… I told her she shouldn’t do it. I advised her to join her other self before it’s too late.” The redhead pinches the bridge of her nose. “When will this child learn?” She wonders out loud.</p><p>“Oh, by any chance had you found Marie’s book?” Lilith asks then. “I have. I don’t know how it got here though,” he answers, having issues following the flow of this odd conversation.</p><p>“I sent it here when Lucifer reached me. Hoped your Aunt would have time to read it. Have you?” Ambrose sighs. “I haven’t reached the marked pages, but I read some other entries and… there’s not one that hasn’t been fulfilled.”</p><p>As if on cue, Lilith feels herself being summoned back to Hell. “I need to go, I was here on Sabrina’s behalf to learn how you all were. I’ll be glad to let her know you all are alive. Ambrose, close your eyes,” she grins. The warlock looks at her confused for a second, yet he does as he was asked. Smiling, Lilith brings Zelda close for one lingering kiss. Then she disappears into thin air.</p><p>“You can open your eyes, Ambrose,” Zelda says, and when he does, he finds her suckling her lower lip but watching the mirror where Lilith now appears. The image is too far away for her nephew to notice the wink Lilith sends on her way before the mirror reflects Zelda again.</p><p>“How we get back to only one Sabrina?” the redhead wonders out loud and Ambrose sighs. “Auntie, we might need the two of them. Unless you have found a way to get rid of her father. He will want her reigning Hell as she’s currently doing, and I’m sure we’ll want her here too. It’s quite the conundrum and as dangerous playing with the fabric of time can be, it’s working at this point.”</p><p>“Yes, because you can’t feel the ripple it has created in the already wrecked balance of the cosmos.” Zelda lets out with little thought. Ambrose looks at her. “Can you, Auntie Zee?”</p><p>“Huh?” She frowns in confusion. “Auntie… I know you didn’t lose your powers when we all did. Now, we all know you summoned hellfire. I thought I knew the extent of your magic, yet… What I felt when you brought Auntie Hilda back… I don’t mean to question you, but you know you could tell us anything, don’t you?”</p><p>“There’s nothing to tell, Ambrose,” she sighs.</p><p>Almost a week goes by, with Zelda missing Lilith and avoiding Marie. She likes the voodoo witch, yet she can’t quite face her or the eagerness of the younger witch to share her personal space. Most nights Zelda returns to the mortuary and battles her insomnia with herbs.</p><p>It doesn’t help that Hilda’s usually bubbliness has grown tenfold now that she’s preparing her wedding. No matter how much Zelda loves her, there’s not enough alcohol in the world to help her through this. So, instead, she buries herself and her abandonment issues in the library. Trying to find out anything at all about time paradoxes, or why there are so many ripples in the fabric of the cosmos.</p><p>Day eight is one of those nights where she’s back at the academy for some non-sense, and the devil’s hour finds her pacing the corridors to the kitchen when she feels the warmth of Lilith’s magic overflowing the room.  “Lilith,” she whispers with her back to the demoness.</p><p>“There are issues, Zelda.” Lilith states. “Why isn’t that surprising?” Zelda sighs and turns around, and she feels her rage grow. It’s barely over a week later, yet the demoness belly is protruding as if her pregnancy was further along than the few days it has. However, it’s not only that, it’s the dark under her eyes that’s not only out of restlessness if the broken lip’s something to go by.</p><p>“Heavens, Lilith. What has he done to you?” She whispers, placing her hands over her love’s cheeks, and sending a healing spell that’s a balm to Lilith’s soul. “Ah, it’s nothing. I refused to help him overthrow whatever Blackwood brought to us.”</p><p>“Blackwood?” Zelda frowns in confusion. “Yes, your husband seems to have found access to ancient magic.” The redhead flinches.</p><p>“Don’t call him that!” She hisses. Lilith sways in place. “I’m sorry,” the demoness lets out. “I’m exhausted, Zelda. I’m… I’m sorry. I didn’t think... I...”</p><p>“Stop apologizing!” Zelda grouses and teleports them both to her room at the Academy. Locking her door and covering Lilith’s magic to stop anyone else from knowing she’s there. “Rest, you need to sleep.” It’s in Zelda’s arms that she remembers the prophecy.</p><p>“It’s not until the Heir of Earth visits hell that it will complete its metamorphosis, and they will know of its hierarchy.” Lilith mumbles. “You died… you…” she thinks. “Oh, Zelda. What I need is for you to tell them. You need to accept yourself and awake your powers. You need to transform into who you are.”</p><p>“Lilith, you must have been running a fever. You are making no sense at all.” The High Priestess says placing a chilly hand over her warmed body. Lilith swats the hand away and stands up, pacing the room. “You need to tell them, you need to grasp your power wholly, or we won’t survive to whatever thing Blackwood found and called. You are the only one we need to awaken to stop this.” The demoness states.</p><p>“Me?” Zelda chuckles. All the hard work the Spellman’s had done to keep her contained, drowning her in her self-loathing ways. “I’m nothing but a silly witch, Lilith. If you, a demoness, and Lucifer, a god damned fallen angel, can’t defeat what it’s coming, why would I make any difference?” the redhead wonders.</p><p>“Well, I don’t know. All I know is the damned prophecy said the Heir of Earth will perish and will be reborn into his new heights. Although, unaware of any novelty,” the demoness quotes. “You died and were brought back to life. I can feel how much your powers have grown.”</p><p>“Heir of Earth, Lily… If that was meant to be me, it would be an Heiress, wouldn’t it?” Zelda points out. The demoness huffs. “Stop giving me excuses, Zelda! Grab the courage you like to pretend you have and claim the powers that belong to you. If not for you, or your family… do it for this child. I can hardly protect this child by myself!” She huffs.</p><p>“This child? You mean the one you created to save your life? The one for which you fornicated with my hated husband to create? The one result of a tryst that ended up with the bastard bearing the mark of Cain, and now we can’t exactly kill him easily? When all it brings to me is pain?” Zelda asks. “Why would I want to protect it?” she finishes.</p><p>Despite not feeling the High Priestess pain thrumming underneath her skin as the demoness was so used to whenever they discussed before, the mother of demons knows by the shade her love’s eyes are painted as an angry ocean storm, for how the redhead is frowning, and how her breathing is elaborated… As for how she’s all covered with a red flush, that’s not from their mating… Despite not feeling her feelings, she reads perfectly how much agony Zelda’s words carry.</p><p>“Because it is your child, Zelda. It’s yours, not Lucifer’s. Your doing, not Blackwood’s.” Lilith pleads, only getting the redhead chuckling almost maniacally at this.</p><p>“Heavens, Lilith, when you lie, you surely have no qualms, darling. How could I give you a child? I’m not a male. You said it yourself. You couldn’t give me one even if it were my last request. Why would I, a simple witch, be any different?”</p><p>“How would I know? All I know is that this child is yours, I knew it was there before I fornicated with your hated husband, as you delightfully put it. I will do anything in my hands to protect it. As I am, by telling Lucifer it’s his son. I swear to you I will die before I allow your child to be harmed, but even I have limits, Zelda. I can’t protect it from both Lucifer and whatever thing Blackwood summoned. Not all of us get to resurrect to protect our loved ones, you know?” She lets out, and she feels Zelda’s rage piling up in the way she’s getting redder by the second.</p><p>“One truth, Lilith…” Zelda sighs tiredly. “Did you ever tell me just one full truth?”</p><p>“I did it! Several of them, you know this!” Lilith pleads. “There’s one I’ve never told you. I’m not sure you will believe me now, though…” The demoness adds, biting her lower lip. Looking at this creature breaking in front of her, Zelda finally lets her walls down enough to allow herself to care about the woman she loves in the way she wants to, but fights against.</p><p>“Then, go on…” The redhead says, wanting to get a cigarette more than anything at the moment, yet not doing it out of respect for the baby her Lily carries. Lilith stands up, and walks closer and closer to Zelda, until they are almost inches away from each other, and the wall it’s the only thing stopping her love from scurrying away from her.</p><p>With Zelda trapped between her and the wall, Lilith waits until guarded greens find her blue ones, and then she goes all in. “I love you, Zelda Phiona Spellman, and there’s no greater truth to be said to you than those three little words.”</p><p>The High Priestess feels Lilith’s magic growing and surrounding them, wrapping them in a powerful cloud that could’ve tackled anyone else, bringing them down to their knees. Yet, they stand in the middle of the vortex, unmoving. Zelda’s own energies pleading to be freed.</p><p>The redhead hand finds Lilith’s cheek and wipes softly a trail of tears that had run free. “It’s a beautiful truth, Lily, yet it comes too late,” Zelda whispers, taking a step to the side and walking past the demoness.</p><p>“My coven and I… We will help you protect yourself and the child if the need arises. I’ve already negated asylum to you once. I won’t ever do that again.” She throws over her shoulders, not wanting to see the devastation she’s leaving behind. She knows, because even if she can no longer feel Lilith underneath her skin… Zelda still can feel her own self crumbling with every step she forces herself to take.</p><p>Marie is safer. The redhead thinks, pressing a hand over her breaking heart. She thought she had experienced it all, yet Zelda Phiona Spellman had never experienced a Hell-like this one.</p><p>“Wait, Zelda… Please…” Lilith calls and she stops. “At least face me when you do this, damn it!” Against her better judgment, Zelda does turn around and faces the demoness. The face of the mother of demons is covered with tears, traces of old and fresh ones marring her skin.</p><p>The directrix's heart constricts at the sight. Isn’t she even worse than Lucifer? Aren’t these tears just proof of how wrong they are for each other? Zelda wonders.</p><p>“I love you, Lily, but I can’t go on like this. There has to be more than this constant shoving and pulling we do. There has to be more than waiting for you to appear in the darkest of the corners, of not knowing you, of not having you…. More than just fearing you are gone during every single minute, you aren’t here. That being terrified of learning that I lost you... There has to be more… for me… for you… than this constant pain that we create into each other’s lives.”</p><p>“There is more, Zelda! I love you! Damn it! I know what it’s like to lose you! You died! You left me empty, bereft, and with child! Do you think I want this? Do you think I want to live with the uncertainty of my own survival? While hoping this pregnancy does last thirteen months- which it seems obvious to me, it won’t. When He is throwing one acceleration spell over the next one to bring “his son” faster to this world-" She says waving towards her growing belly.</p><p>“Every moment that escapes my grasp, it’s a minute closer to my death in the hands of the one being that has shown me anything but mercy. Even when I gave him my all. Yet, I have to figure out how to save myself from him, if only for a moment. To get this child, your child, to you, and don’t give him a chance to get his filthy hands in this precious life. Do you have any idea what it’s like to live every hour, every second wondering how to escape your fate?”</p><p>“As a matter of fact, I do,” Zelda answers, clearing her own tears with the back of her hand. “I’ve been under a Caligari spell, and you know this!”</p><p>“I don’t care what he puts me through, Zelda. I just… I’ve lost thousands of children’s, darling, you know this. Yet, this one, it is ours… I can’t… I can’t lose it too,” She finally crumbles, falling heavily on her knees.</p><p>“How can I believe you, Lily? Find me one explanation as to how I made it happen, and I swear to you, you’ll never be alone anymore. But… How can you ask of me to help you protect their kid? When all they did to us was trying to subdue us? When all we got from them it’s pain?” She asks in a whisper, collecting the demoness in her arms, rocking them both as if they were nothing but kids trying to be comforted. “I’ll help you keep it safe, Lily… But don’t ask me to love it, please… not when I don’t know if I can. Not when I know the child might be innocent, yet his sperm donors are anything but. Not when there’s a chance it looks like them and behaves like them, and there’s nothing at all I can do to change it.”</p><p>As they cry in each other’s arms, they both wonder if they aren’t being incredibly selfish. But they carry enough traumas that most wouldn’t understand. This is just triggering them in ways neither felt comfortable with, and both had issues grasping.</p>
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<a name="section0044"><h2>44. Chapter 44</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Sorry I've almost disappeared on you, guys. Life was hectic... but now I've seen Part 4 and we can move on (?)</p><p>So... hum... ready to keep reading the angstier of the angst?<br/>#spoilers for Part 4 ep 1.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It is behind the closed door of Zelda’s room at the academy, that the Heir of Earth and the Exiled Wanderer cry their pains together crumpled on the floor, their faces hidden as they hold to each other for dear life. If only they knew. If only they weren’t so fearful of what could be…</p><p>“I feel I’m always failing you, Lily. Every time you need me, you get not exactly what you came for…” the redhead sighs and gulps back another sob.</p><p>“I don’t know if I can take it anymore…” Zelda whispers. “I’m not sure I’m strong enough to love… It,” she says, and the demoness realizes that even in the tangled mess they are, the High Priestess has found a way to avoid her belly.</p><p>“Come,” Zelda says, standing on quacking legs with cracking knees. Yet, offering her a hand to pull her up. With a powerful pull, Lilith finds herself almost home and must bite back the pain for the way the redhead keeps avoiding parts of her body.</p><p>“You are far stronger than you give yourself credit for, love,” Lily smiles, moving bright red and now messed locks away from the face of her darling. “I understand. Even If I don’t want to… You love so fiercely, so deeply… “ she states searching green eyes. “I understand your reluctance to add one more being to your shoulders when there are already so many to protect. When we both can feel there’s another evil looming and there’s a chance of losing it all.” </p><p>Zelda doesn’t say a word. What could she possibly add when her Lily has her all figured out? Instead, she links their hands. “You need to rest. You needed the rest before we went all crazy with feelings,” she says tabling again the uncomfortable subject for now.</p><p>“Oh, why High Priestess? Is it me or you are trying to get me into your bed?” the demoness jokes with a playful smirk and her heart skips a beat when the redhead laughs. “Not at all, my dear. I pretend to take you to ours,” the redhead adds.  It’s just then that Lilith notices they had left the academy premises in favor of Zelda’s cottage. </p><p>The Directrix smiles. With a wave of her hand, they are both naked as they preferred when together, and she helps her Lily to bed, before walking around and accommodating herself too. As they usually did, they lay facing each other, legs tangled. Yet, this time they are far away enough that Zelda isn’t even near to the growing being inside Lilith’s body.</p><p>“You are right, Lily. I fear loving your child,” the Spellman witch says, caressing her sharp cheek with melting affection. “I’m exhausted, darling, this might be too much even for me, especially for me…” she confesses. The demoness can see exactly how much in those troubled ocean greens that, despite it all, look at her with such unbridled affection.</p><p>“Sometimes, I just want to get back to those years when Edward was the High Priest and my hardest day consisted of pretending, I had no power or knowledge beyond the basics to share. That all Zelda Spellman was, was a devout little thing. Now, as I become more and more what I always feared, what the Spellman’s made me fear of myself… It seems they were right, that it could only bring trouble. That I could only bring troubles… My days are filled with so much more than I can deal with, than my own issues have been buried inside me, and I find myself incapable of rationalizing them. I’m hurting people I love because I’m hurt. Because I can’t live without you and I can’t have you,” the redhead whispers. Her hand never stopped caressing the warm flesh of her back or the soft hairs of her love.</p><p>“I understand, love. I wish I didn’t, so I could lash out at you. But I understand. It’s been too much in such a short amount of time that sometimes I wonder about my sanity too. Yet, I must confess that what has me moving forth when my strength is lacking … it is you. The memories of those stolen moments. The sweet, divine way you love me. The sex too.” She grins, making Zelda giggle at it. “Rest now, my love. For your soul is as exhausted, as tortured as mine is. As tired as I look”. </p><p>“Why am I always placing you in such weird crossroads?” Zelda mumbles as her head finds the spot she likes to hide in on Lilith's neck. The demoness chuckles at this.</p><p>“It seems fitting,” the first woman says, patting amber tresses softly, feeling the woman relax in her arms, going limp with every soft caress. Their lids are heavy. Peace, the soft way their powers mingle, and only the sounds of their breathing taking the entire room, as Lilith whispers in a sleep ridden voice, “you are after all Hecate’s daughter…”</p><p>“Hmm… I guess that as her High Priestess and member of her order that’s what I am…” Zelda answers, tickling the demoness's neck with her breath. There’s no answer save for a light sigh and the evened out breathing of her love.</p><p>For a moment she remembers how they never had issues falling asleep in each other’s nearness. So different from the hours that had taken her to fall asleep holding Marie. As if truly there wasn’t any safer place for the brunette than Zelda’s arms, and no other peaceful port for the redhead than being tightly surrounded by the demoness. </p><p>Everywhere around them, the Goddess wants to shake her daughter’s stubbornness away. A trait she recognizes clearly. She can’t intervene, this isn’t her choice to make. She has seen all paths, all possible scenarios developing in one way or another. Yet, she knows it's only a matter of bringing the crossroad closer to them, so choosing it’s the only way left.</p><p>Yes, the Goddess can get away with this, and God agrees.</p><p>The next morning, Lilith wakes up first, as she usually did. She takes her time to observe her love, to notice the new stress lines that are there barely visible for the untrained eye. Yet, she sees it. She touches them and makes them terse again, it’s not because she can’t accept Zelda is aging too, but because she knows how harsh the High Priestess is on herself. Her stomach growls, and there’s a giggle coming from the supposedly asleep redhead.</p><p>“I keep a kettle and cookies in my room, I can offer you some as breakfast,” Zelda grins, blushing at this confession and pecking her love’s lips. Before stretching on the bed. “Yes, feed me…” Lilith says pleadingly, “hell’s food isn’t quite nice as they might have led you to believe…”  </p><p>Zelda stands up and helps her up before she looks down at their naked forms. “I don’t know how long I have until they summon me again,” Lilith whispers. “Otherwise, you know I always loved to be part of your routines.”</p><p>“Right,” the redhead grins and kisses her. As tongues duel, Lilith dresses them and Zelda makes sure to lock her door at the academy and cover any trace of her Lily’s magic, before transporting them there. Still too absorbed in the mix of their magics, the transportation and just plainly kissing her darling senseless, that she fails to feel the third energy until it’s too late. A throat clears in the background and they part, only to find Ambrose sitting on Zelda’s bed avoiding looking at them.</p><p>“Aunties,” he greets them with a playful smile, getting an eye roll from Zelda and a grin from Lilith. (Who won’t tell anyone just how good it felt like to be recognized as part of someone’s family). “What do you need, Ambrose?”</p><p>“I came to check up on the last details for the rededication of the Academy… as you requested?” He adds, trying to keep his smile at bay but failing miserably. “I should go,” Lilith states then, before she adds a playful, “Ambrose?”</p><p>“Yup, I’ll turn around. No worries, I don’t need to see that again…” He offers, already facing away from them. Zelda blushes fiercely, and the demoness bites her lower lip to keep her smile at bay. Although, she knows it’s not happening. The redhead looks at her, huffing before she simply threads a hand on the soft brown mane bringing her close, lips colliding and all thoughts about all the mockery she will get from Ambrose are forgotten. They part with a slight touch of foreheads and yet another “I’m sorry,” from Zelda.</p><p>A box of cookies that was hidden inside Zelda’s vanity falls into Lilith’s hand, and the demoness smiles before she disappears with a last quick peck on soft lips. They might be twin souls, but there’s yet too much work to do before they can truly be one. There’s still one decision Zelda needs to make.</p><p>“Let’s go to my office,” Zelda says, and Ambrose stands up, following her along the corridors. “Not that I’m not happy for you, Auntie,” Ambrose says as they walk. “But what about Marie?”</p><p>“What about Marie?” the redhead asks, barely glancing at him. “I thought you had something going on?” He prods. Zelda sighs and sits elegantly in her chair. As she does, she waves her hand, closing the door behind them, so they won’t be disturbed. “It is… complicated, Ambrose. Rest assured I’m not playing with them.”</p><p>“I suppose that’s all I should worry about. But, truly, I’m worried that you would end up hurt, Auntie.”</p><p>“There’s no way I won’t, Ambrose. That’s just how life works. We all know one isn’t without pains, we cannot measure our true happiness if we haven’t first been burnt to crisps by blinding pain. It’s part of the duality of the world we live in.”  She shrugs and Ambrose smiles. He knows the Hell his Aunt already went through, so her happiness most likely was supposed to be brighter than anyone.</p><p>“Now, how would you feel about Prudence being our Maiden?” She wonders. “Prudence, not Sabrina?” Ambrose squints at her. “Well, since I will be the crone, and your Aunt Hilda the mother.”</p><p>“That’s fitting for your ancient age,” he jokes, knowing it will annoy her. “Seriously, Auntie, you are not only the oldest remaining witch of our little coven -and that by no means make you old-. But you are the most knowledgeable, too.  It makes sense. As does, that Auntie Hilda represents the mother since that’s what she’s been doing since the poisoning. But I see what you are going with. You think that by picking Sabrina you might cause a slight discomfort at the coven as all the Spellmans take the place of honor.”</p><p>“Precisely. Besides, I’m quite certain that your cousin might benefit from a break.” Zelda adds. “She truly worries me, Ambrose. Both of them.” She sighs.</p><p>“Well, there’s nothing you can do for the one you can’t see, and the one we do know, it’s more closed off than she was before.” Ambrose sighs.</p><p>“I suppose I can only hope she understands we are here for her, that we care about her. Now, as I’ve said before, not a word that I know she’s playing with the ripples of time, and we should start prepping, Ambrose.”</p><p>It’s after the ceremony, when she finally gets back to her office, that she feels Marie joining her. Something is charming about this woman, and it intrigues Zelda. Yes, she knows Marie is no Lilith, but she also knows the voodooist is hiding something from her. She can play this game. She has played this game several times before; the Directrix thinks as she takes a sip of her glass.</p><p>“Do you really think I’m a crone?” Zelda asks, sitting beside Marie on her desk. Playing with her own fears to try to pry what the woman really wants. That Marie looks centuries younger would’ve been a cause of self-doubts if she wanted to pursue a relationship with this woman.</p><p>The age difference between warlocks and witches was nothing but common. Hence, the way they never cared about how Nick was much older than Sabrina. Or how Prudence was much younger than Ambrose. Or even how much older than Cerberus was Hilda. However, there were days when being only seven years older than Hilda weighted heavily on Zelda. So, she could play the ‘I’m old’ card masterfully.</p><p>“Will I do this…” Marie says, placing a kiss on her hand. “If I thought…” dark lips connect with her neck, “you were a crone?” the voodoo witch adds, and finally, pecks her lips. Yet, it’s the way Marie kisses her that makes her even warier. There’s a hint of an enchantment in the way her ears ring with each kiss she places. But Zelda’s magic is now far stronger -even if she isn’t fully aware of it- and protects her from falling prey to whatever it was. The Directrix plays along, though, because she is still curious by nature and well, she has never rejected being the object of someone’s affection if it’s freely given.</p><p>She doesn’t allow it to go further, though. Despite hiding most of the time from this woman, the High Priestess was honest with Marie, thus the voodoo witch knows about her Lily. Even if the redhead isn’t sure she knows who Lilith really is. “You should go, Marie… I still have plenty to do.” She excuses herself. “This curriculum won’t fix itself.”</p><p>“Don’t work too hard, Cherie.” The woman adds. Another ringing in Zelda’s ear makes her smile softly as she watches her leave. She’s not quite surprised when Hilda comes prodding for answers. Even if she knows Marie isn’t the woman, she had seen Zelda entangled with, but she also knows her sister is most definitively not a prude.</p><p>Truly, until the previous night, it had been nothing but issues piling themselves inside the Academy’s walls and her own escapism away of Hilda’s unending chirpiness what had kept her away from her own bed. She tries to keep the smile away from her words since it’s just a day away from her memories of holding her Lily.  Even if they didn’t make love… Even when she couldn’t quite work around the idea of that baby bump on her lover’s body.</p><p>But as if to prove her point one child comes shouting about terrible darkness, and off she goes to solve another issue for another soul that is by far less conflicted than her own.</p><p>She doesn’t expect this issue to pain her so much, though. Zelda doesn’t even consider how much someone who knew her brokenness could exploit her, leaving her fighting for her sanity, while she raises her hand to protect the children. Zelda Spellman might have deemed herself as the crone, but she’s as much as a caring mother as Hilda is.  </p><p>She hears the voice in her head, vibrant, more toxic than her own thoughts. Because this entity is digging deep in her darker thoughts and pushing them through. “No, stop it.” She says and later she wonders if her words are what brought Hilda to the room. “Stop it.” She whispers as tears fall from her eyes as he recites truths she fights not to believe. “Stop!” she shouts.</p><p>And then Hilda saves her from her own mind.  Zelda keeps the darkness restrained, but it’s Hilda’s strength that solves their issue.  Hildie, who rarely shows her darker side, is the one that saves them all, pulling the mask away and freeing them from the darkness.</p><p>Instead of feeling grateful, it is shame that drowns her. The humiliation of being paralyzed by these fears. The degradation of needing Hilda’s help to fight a bully when she herself had been her sister’s bully most of her life. “Are you all right, love?”  Hilda asks, nonetheless because that’s her nature. It always was or so, Zelda thinks.  To care without restrictions about everyone, including her. “I…” But the High Priestess is too broken to don her armor, she’s too tortured to lie. “I’m not sure.” She lefts out before heading out of the room, searching for comfort, any kind of it will do.</p><p>She wills her cigarette box and lighter as she walks towards the entry. Air… she needs air.</p><p>The redhead is starting her second fag in a row when Hilda finds her thanks to the burning end of the cigarette. The night covers her with her veil, one almost as dark as the room was before. Yet, Zelda is sitting in all her regal composure in one of the benches placed in the covert garden than no mortal sees thanks to the number of wards it has around.  The redhead feels her sister’s magic, and that makes her straighten her back further.</p><p>“Zelds?” Hilda tries. “May I?” As an answer, Zelda puffs and waves towards the free end of the bench. “Make yourself comfortable, sister,” she says.</p><p>“What happened?” Hilda asks after a moment. “Didn’t you hear it?” She wonders. “Hear, what?”</p><p>“The voice, shouting my fears. Making everything I am, crumble with loud whispered words,” Zelda states, taking another drag.</p><p>“No. I think it meant it to you and only to you. I went only to check what was taking you so long.  I … I know that face, sister. I’ve seen you carry that expression most of our childhood…”</p><p>“I guess I never really protected you from the truth, did I?” Zelda chuckles tearily. “I’m a lie, Hilda. I’m nothing but a lie,” she lets out. There’s no self-deprecation, no self-hate… just plain acceptance of a truth she can believe. She’s not even a Spellman…</p><p>“No, love,” Hilda says. Her eyes are also filled with tears, suffering for her sister’s agony. “You are a strong, resilient, witch. The most powerful I know. Yes, you have zero people's skills now, but I remember you, I remember your cheeriness. How sweet you were, how protective you are. Zelds, you are so much more than you give yourself credit for… I only wish you saw a half of what I see. I wish you would let me in too…”</p><p>Zelda suckles her lower lip and turns around slightly to face her sister. There are tears pooling in both their eyes. The redhead clenches her jaw. A fat, thick droplet forming in the corner of one stormy green eye. “Are you sure, sister?” she wonders, caressing Hilda’s cheek lovingly.</p><p>“You are my best friend, Zelds. The only friend I’ve got. Yeah, you kill me every once in a while, but you make the effort to bring me back to life. Heck! You performed a whole ritual to drag me back from death. What kind of friend would I be, if I wasn’t here for you when you finally are ready to open up?”  Zelda says nothing, but caresses Hilda’s cheek softly and lets herself go. Not fully, not even half of what she feels. She wants her sister to understand, if only just for a minimum, what it is like to be Zelda Phiona Spellman. The plain torture that it means existing for her.</p><p>Hilda gasps for air, tears falling heavily, drenching the top of her blouse. Not even all the bullying she had spent her life suffering prepares her for this. The harrowing of Zelda’s soul is unrelenting. There are self-doubts, self-deprecation, hate, rage, apprehension, terror, fear… that leave Hilda panting, wondering how on Earth her sister keeps everything inside, how she wakes up every morning, and how she loves them so. Understanding now better why everything seems so bitter when it came from her.</p><p>Then something changes, but she’s engrossed in Zelda’s dark emotions to feel the third magic joining them. Until all the dark feelings are replaced by overwhelming love. “Lily,” Zelda whispers, closing herself off allowing Hilda to take a deep breath. As she does, the blonde finds herself in her own room at the Mortuary, wondering what the heavens happened and how she got there. Her last memory is of having stepped out of the Academy and into the mortuary in a transportation enchantment she never made.</p><p>“What’s wrong, love?” It’s the first thing out of Lilith’s mouth as she transports Hilda out of the equation. Yet, it’s Zelda who deletes the last minutes of her sister’s mind. So she won’t have to bear, not even the slightness of her emotions. Hilda deserves to be carefree; she thinks. She has robbed her sister of so much already to burden her with her feelings too.</p><p>“Hold me?” Zelda whispers and the broken whisper that comes out shatters the demoness's heart. She sits on the now unoccupied side of the bench and brings the redhead close. “It seems we are always breaking together,” Lilith says to the redhead’s ear as she snuggles her close, transporting them to their safe place once she does. “Let me feel you,” she whispers, “we are alone, and I can take it.”</p><p>Zelda squirms back for a second, looking around before her gaze falls into the blue eyes she loves. The demoness had felt her before, running deep underneath her skin, and had not even once looked at her as if she wasn’t worthy. But the High Priestess has felt her too, so she smiles between tears. “Only if I can feel you too, it’s only fair.”</p><p>“I can’t stay too long, love,” Lilith says, clearing the tears away from her cheeks. “They are having yet another party, but they are bound to find that I’m gone. Yet, there’s no one else I would love to be broken with…” she says, and as soft lips find plump ones, they let the other feel what they are carrying. All the painful emotions they keep hidden deep within themselves are out for the other to experience. They kiss, swallowing tears that fall free, healing what they couldn’t before. Until they summon the demoness back to her own version of Hell.</p><p>“I love you, Zelda,” Lilith whispers once more, pecking her swollen lips before she teleports the High Priestess to the bathroom of her room at the mortuary where she has an inkling the redhead will hide for a while. And she transports herself to Hell, under the glamor to cover all glamor’s, if only to show that she isn’t torn by letting her love go when she needs her the most.</p><p>At the mortuary, the eldest Spellman drops to her knees, “I love you, Lily,” she whispers. Then she drags herself to the shower. Opening it, Zelda Spellman allows herself to cry.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0045"><h2>45. Chapter 45</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>OMG! Thank you for all your beautiful comments!<br/>Although, now I'm terrified I will screw this one up ... yikes!<br/>Oh! and sorry it took me so long, first, it was too short, then too damn long, and now... I think it's good enough. </p><p>#spoilers for P4 episodes 1 and 2</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When the sun came out the next morning, no one could doubt the state of mind of one Zelda Spellman. She’s back to her stern-looking self and looking gloriously composed for someone who had been tortured inside her own mind. Or at least, she thinks so as she reads her Croatian Times and smokes.</p><p>But as Sabrina questions her about what that could have the dark specter be, she looks at her niece and tells them what had happened. They need to know, she assesses, in case they encounter them. So now being warned, they can run as fast as they can away from it.</p><p>It feels like there’s more to this. Just like Mambo Marie feels like more… Zelda thinks as she smiles at the vodouisant when they cross paths at the Academy. At least, she’s doing a marvelous job with the teaching, the redhead thinks.</p><p>The day goes by quickly, which is not surprising with all the tasks she must juggle every day now. It’s almost twilight when Prudence shows up at her office, requesting a meeting. The girl talks about an eldritch terror and a plan of sorts.</p><p>As much as she wants to keep the coven protected, Zelda also feels the way the cosmos is behaving even more erratic than before. She doesn’t want to agree with the three women in front of her, yet she knows it’s the only way. At least, if Hecate does help them.</p><p>Calling the coven, they sit for a quick and hearty meal. They will need the strength if they plan to hold the darkness inside Greendale boundaries until sunrise. Once they are all done, they prepare everything for their ritual. Candles are placed and lit quickly as Zelda readies the sacred space where they will stand-in.</p><p>Once again afraid of the results of her powers being on display, Zelda doesn’t form part of the casting circle per se, remaining inside it. Her energies mixing from within, keeping the coven -and Marie- unaware of how much of what they are feeling comes from her.</p><p>All around them, the goddess groans. Of course, they would call upon her for help, since Lilitu is still in Hell, and her daughter is still oblivious to her roots. But she has always been a softie for her daughter, no matter how much she had never prayed to her before resurrecting. So she helps them. Next to her, God laughs. “See, it’s not only my side.”  If the goddess had human eyes, she would’ve rolled them.</p><p>Inside the academy walls, the coven chant, having no real clue if this is working or not, to keep the darkness at bay. Out of a sudden, Prudence interrupts, and Zelda just knows she won’t like this. “We need to refocus our energies.” The girl says.</p><p>“On what?” She wonders annoyed, and of course, Sabrina would’ve come up with a plan that placed her in harm’s way. Zelda wants to roll her eyes while trying to get herself composed. This child will be the death of her, she thinks. So, she lets out a “For Pity’s sake!”</p><p>Squaring her shoulders at this recent development, the High Priestess takes a deep breath, wondering what exactly they can do since what they were doing wouldn’t work for this scenario.</p><p>Suddenly, she remembers standing in the darkness at a crossroad lightened by two torches and she knows exactly what to do, and how to do it as if she had done this her whole life.</p><p>“Quick everyone, grab a new candle. We need to light the path.” The High Priestess says, ignoring Hilda’s confused expression as she finds an unlighted candle for herself. “Don’t light them, yet.” She instructs them. “Hilda, when I signal you, follow my words. Prudence, you’ll be the next. Once Hilda and Prudence's candles are lightened, all join. Understood?” She says and waits for the nods all around her.</p><p>Placing herself in the middle of the circle once more, she starts. “Hecate, Gatekeeper, Guardian, Guide, stand among us side by side. Hecate light your torch’s flame every time we call your name. Hallowed Mother, Maiden, Crone, through the dark, your light be shone.” Zelda says firmly, and her candle flicks on by itself. She looks at Hilda, who joins her unsurely at first, and then her candle lights too. She points at Prudence then, who joins them, and finally, the entire coven follows, chanting in unison.</p><p>As requested by her words, every time they call her name candles around them glow. Once they are all on, Zelda joins it in the circle, not once halting her words. They don’t stop, not even when there’s a bright white light shining down on their Hecate’s statue. Not until Ambrose tells them it worked.</p><p>Whereas the coven feels invigorated, vibrant with this energy that makes them feel excited. Zelda feels utterly spent. Her magic siphoned out of her in a way that makes her think that it was Hecate’s price for helping them. ‘At least, no one is the wiser,’ the redhead thinks as she steps away from the room and rests against the outside wall. The whole damned building moving around her as she stands still and breathes. The High Priestess just hopes there will be time before the next terror appears, just in case she needs to be drained again.</p><p>Thankfully, the Directrix reaches her room at the Academy with no one noticing her swaying walk. She falls into her bed like the deadweight she feels she is. The High Priestess’s eyes fall closed until the feeling of a warm body lying next to hers surprises her. A soft hand caresses her hair lovingly, raising goosebumps in her skin. Zelda barely manages to raise her head to find Lilith watching over her, a worried smile on her face. “What are you doing here, Lily?”</p><p>“Well, I was in the neighborhood.” The demoness lies with a grin, and her hand comes down from the redhead’s hair to trace the soft contours of Zelda’s face. “I’ve missed you, so I thought I could drop by for a moment. What’s wrong? You look exhausted, love.”</p><p>“We had to make a ritual to enlighten the darkness. It took a lot of me.” Zelda confesses, turning around to be on her side, but her lids are heavy and she fights them to remain open. “You coven seems exuberant with renewed energy, I can hear them even from here.” Lilith frowns in confusion, accommodating herself in their usual tangled mess, yet respecting Zelda’s last wishes of not being close to her bump.</p><p>“Yes. I don’t understand quite well what happened. I think since I was the one calling the shots, it was my magic the first one used.” Lilith kisses her temple then, sending a small discharge of her energy. “That should help.”</p><p>“Thanks, Lily, you shouldn’t have. You need to keep your strength,” Zelda smiles, and even when she hasn’t fully accepted Lilith’s pregnancy yet, and in her extreme exhaustion, the redhead moves forward to claim a kiss. The demoness doesn’t negate her, indulging in a languid pace that just makes sense for them. “You need to go, love. Marie is approaching,” Zelda states then, as they feel the voodoo witch’s energy getting closer.</p><p>“And you are letting her into your room? Into your bed?” Lilith wonders. “Careful, darling, your jealous is showing,” Zelda grins, nuzzling her neck and placing a kiss that makes a puddle off of the demoness. “No, Lily. I would’ve teleported myself to the mortuary, but I’m too tired to do so love.”</p><p>“Your requests are orders, Madam Spellman,” Lilith says, and kisses her hair. “I need to go, my darling. They are summoning me again,” she adds, rolling her eyes. “Sweet dreams, my sweetness.”</p><p>“Thank you, Lily.” Zelda grins. Soft lips caress hers in an almost ghostly touch before she’s left alone in her room at the mortuary. For a moment, the High Priestess wonders if she could ever muster enough courage to ask Lilith to leave something of hers behind so she can embrace it during those nights when loneliness hit so darkly. But then again, that’d be too silly for someone as old as she is.</p><p>However, she must let out a laugh when she notices one of her pillows is missing, and in replacement, there’s another one covered in red silk. Bringing it close, she smells her Lily on it and succumbs to a dreamless night.</p><p>Their few next days go like that, with Marie attempting to woe her and Zelda trying to figure out what is that the witch is hiding. And Lilith escaping Hell for brief visits to her beloved. At least, the demoness had convinced Lucifer to stop growing the child.</p><p>“So, want to see if your niece comes clean about being there two of them?” Lilith wonders one night as Zelda cuddles up to her, hiding her face in the crook of her neck. A soft moan escapes them both. “What do you mean?”</p><p>“Well, my Sabrina is getting married to clay boy. So, I might drop by tomorrow to discuss this with you.” Lilith whispers. Zelda huffs, “Married? She’s sixteen!”</p><p>“Yes, my thoughts exactly. However, I wasn’t even that age when I met Lucifer. And as her father, he doesn’t disagree. ‘A good alliance’ he says,” Lilith barks a laugh. “You know your niece, even if this one seems far less mature than the one you are dealing with, mine just wants to get married. I’ll never understand people who willingly want to marry…out of so-called love,” she huffs, making Zelda laugh. “Haven’t you just said you did it with Lucifer?” she points out.</p><p>“That doesn’t count. Heavens, there wasn’t a ceremony or... Well, anything. Just me bowing down to him, stupidly blinded. I learn from my mistakes, though.” She lets out, and she sees Zelda flinch for a second. “Besides, you are married, too. For a far better reason, if you ask me, but you still know how that whole wrecked institution goes.” Lilith whispers, and the redhead can’t help but nod in agreement.</p><p>“Indeed. Even so, I don’t think it will be enough for Sabrina to confess to what she’s done. I’m sure it will require a lot more than her other self getting married, for mine to disclose it. Perhaps she can help you with discouraging yours from a wedding?” Zelda says. Understanding her thoughts, Lilith smirks. “I wish you could be my date for Hilda’s.” The redhead confesses then.</p><p>“I’m sorry that I can’t. I would love to see you even more dressed up. Although, if I must pick, I’ll choose to see you with no dress at all, and you know this.” She wriggles her eyebrows mischievously, making the redhead laughs. “You, my dear demoness, are incorrigible,” Zelda grins, pecking her lips.</p><p>A proud smile washes the mother of demons’ face, “I know, and you wouldn’t have me any other way. Now, what about these terrors things? Any more have appeared?”</p><p>“Don’t make me start on them! I’m jealous they aren’t appearing in hell. It’s nerve-racking that we don’t know when they will show up or how they look. It adds a whole additional layer of stress into finishing details for Hilda’s wedding.”</p><p>“Now that she’s finally getting married to the funny shop keeper. Are you dealing with that incubus trapped in him? Or want me to step in?” Lilith offers. “Don’t worry about it, Love. I’ll send Mr. Scratch with someone to get it out. It’s after all a simple trick. Oh, I must warn you. If you happen to pop up that day at the party… Hilda believes I disappear into the night because of Marie. Since she knows nothing about us. Thus, she placed her in the main table.”</p><p>“So, that means I shouldn’t be jealous if I see you standing way too close to Mambo Marie?” She says the name with derision. “Something is off with that witch.”</p><p>“I agree. That’s why I’ll rather keep her close.” Zelda states, and she just knows what’s coming next by the sheer naughtiness of Lilith’s expression. “I’ll rather keep you close. But ugh, your Hell-niece has the worse timing ever. I gotta go.” She huffs. “Oh, wait… allow me…” The brunette says before she moves to grab the pillow that had popped in Zelda’s bed days earlier.</p><p>“Hey! I liked it,” the redhead complains, feeling outraged when the red pillow disappears from her bed. “Just getting you a fresher one, love,” Lilith says, replacing it with a dark purple one. “And I’ll take this one if you don’t mind,” she winks, placing her hand over the one Zelda was lying on. “Sweet dreams, darling.”</p><p>As the pillow disappears from under Zelda’s head, the demoness pulls her up slightly and kisses her. The moment the place where warm lips where feels cold, Zelda sighs. She’s grateful for the effort Lilith is putting into this, trying to keep her accompanied, and yet, her fears are many. Her self-doubt, a product of the many years of bullying she’s endured, presents itself harshly. Telling her she’s just not good enough for the demoness. That no Sabrina is summoning her back to Hell, just the mother of demons running away from Zelda’s complicated self.  The redhead convinces herself that the happiness that blossoms whenever there’s just the two of them has no future at all.</p><p>In Hell, Lilith wonders if her quick visits are doing them any good. She keeps leaving Zelda behind and she knows by the time they got to spend together when she was just Mary, that her abandonment issues are plenty. Still, she hasn’t found a way to make things more permanent. Or how to free herself of her fate.</p><p>It worries her that one day their babe will be born, and she won’t be able to protect it. That Lucifer will kill her before she can deliver the baby to her love. And she worries about Zelda…. Zelda would suffer her loss, wouldn’t she?  But the demoness is pulled out of her train of thoughts with an annoying “Earth to Lilith,” Coming from her charge.</p><p>That night, though, between her bout of self-pity, Zelda feels it. There’s a change not dissimilar to the one she felt when the first terror appeared. She prays to Hecate that whatever it is, it won’t disturb Hilda’s wedding, because if she’s honest… She can’t take any more wedding chat without killing her sister again.</p><p>To confirm what the energies are telling her, the next morning they get three heartless bodies and that can only mean that another terror is looming in Greendale. That’s exactly what she tells Lilith when they find each other that afternoon for tea.</p><p>“Well, I wish I could help but there’s no information about these terrors down there,” she says sitting on Zelda’s lap, and embracing her. The High Priestess moves a strand of soft brown hair away from her face and smiles. “Don’t worry, love. I’m sure we will solve things, one way or another.” She adds, before kissing her. It’s too soon afterward when the Directrix breaks the kiss, resting her forehead on Lilith. “Sabrina is coming, you should…”</p><p>“Your niece… has a way to always get in the way…” Lily growls before disappearing, leaving Zelda enough time to cover her mouth and magically fix her smudged lipstick. “Auntie Zee?”</p><p>“Sabrina, what can I do for you?” She asks. “I… I want to apologize, Auntie,” the girl says shockingly. “I think I’m starting to understand what’s like to be alone.”</p><p>“Oh, Sabrina, you are not alone. You have your Aunt Hilda, and Ambrose… and your mortal friends. How can you be alone?”  The Aunt asks. She wants to include herself, but she knows that Sabrina doesn’t count her in for most things. She’s not the role model of the girl she raised and one day, Zelda will be able to deal with the disappointment that washes over her at knowing she has failed as a not-quite-mother.</p><p>“I…” She starts again but shakes her head. The girl wonders if these weeks alone, distanced from her friends, with all the weight of the past she changed, is what is making her weary. But, even if she knows she could trust in her Aunt to understand, she can’t face whatever wrath it would create. “Never mind, Auntie.” She says and starts to walk away.</p><p>“Sabrina,” Zelda calls, taking a drag of a fresh cigarette. “I’m not good with emotions, especially not other’s emotions. You know it. However, I can tell you this. Hilda searched for her perfect partner since she was a child. Yes, she waited, and suffered, and cried… She laughed a lot too and enjoyed life with no boundaries beyond what she thought of hers. Tomorrow, she will be getting married… to a man she loves, and who in turn respects her and yes, loves her dearly. Good things come to those who wait, they say.”</p><p>Sabrina nods as an answer and walks away before she stops. “And you, Auntie? Will it come to you?” She asks, frowning.</p><p>“Some things…. Already have.”</p><p>“Marie?” the teen asks, wanting to know if that’s who her Auntie is talking about. The redhead gives her cigarette another inhale, before letting the smoke go while looking up. There’s a mysterious smile on her face that Sabrina has never seen on her before. “Can you keep a secret, niece?” She asks, green eyes deeply set on her. The teenage-witch nods once, and the redhead waves her to come closer. “It’s not her.”</p><p>“Really? Marie seems so… cozy around you, and you around her…” Sabrina frowns. “Well, I, too, can keep a secret.” Zelda winks, before pushing her niece towards the door with her magic. “Wait… you said it’s not her… there’s someone else?” she asks, astounded by this. “Bye, Sabrina.” She says, waving her niece out of the room and smiles to herself.</p><p>‘One day I might tell you all who she is,’ she thinks. “But first we need to survive…” she lets out, and then Melvin and Nicholas enter her office.</p><p>“This is a disaster,” she mumbles, turning yet another cigarette on and pacing. After learning about the incubus on the loose and the missing terror. She requests Marie and Prudence to join and seal the desecrated church the best they can against something they don’t quite know.  While she takes it upon herself to try to do the same for Dorian’s.  </p><p>“You are stressed,” Lilith points out the next morning, as she appears inside Zelda’s room at the mortuary. It’s early enough that her presence will go unnoticed for the second it takes the redhead to cover any trace of the demoness magic. Zelda turns around to look at her love, who’s seating comfortably on her bed, with her hands' places softly over the slight bump on her figure. “I’m … worried.” She says it’s barely a whisper when she adds. “I’m terrified, really.”</p><p>“What about?” Lilith says, coming to stand behind her, doubling over to kiss her neck softly. Then they lock eyes through the mirror.  “There’s a terror on the loose, the uninvited. I will head to the desecrated church early with some kids to make sure they know how it looks.”</p><p>“Also, Hilda is leaving.” The mother of demons points out, making Zelda take a deep breath. “I cannot keep her bound here. I understand that… It’s just…”</p><p>“Painful.” The brunette finishes. “She’s not leaving you, Zelda. She’s going to leave this house for a while.”</p><p>“That’s the thing too, Lily. She shouldn’t be the one leaving it. I should. It’s just…I can’t do it.” The redhead confesses and there are tears in her eyes.</p><p>“Oh, love, this is just a bunch of wood. Everything else you might think it is here… It is not bound to this house, it’s bound here… In your mind, and your heart. Sometimes we just want to keep things so tightly wrapped that we hurt ourselves, we burn ourselves with a rope we don’t allow ourselves to let go off.  Hilda living in town, it’s just more convenient for her and her mortal pet. I’m sure they will feel a bit awkward being newlyweds with so many people in the property.”</p><p>“Right.”</p><p>“But that’s not all,” Lilith states looking at her love through thick lashes. “What else?” Another deep breath, this one covers the pain that betrays green eyes. “How can I officiate this ceremony, when I don’t believe in it? When it might bring forth some traumas that we both know I haven’t worked yet?”</p><p>“Do you believe in us?” Lilith asks out of the blue. “In this thing, we have that we don’t name?”</p><p>“Yes, of course.” Zelda states without a hint of doubt. “Can you not see how they love each other?” She continues asking. “Yes,  that’s why I gave them my blessing after all,” The redhead frowns in confusion.</p><p>“Then… what does it matter if you don’t believe in marriage when you do believe in love. In yours, in ours… in theirs… That’s all that should matter, shouldn’t it? Now, I’ll make my best to get my Sabrina to send me over to watch the wedding. Will you be able to concentrate and cover my magic if I appear?”</p><p>“Without a doubt.” Zelda nods. “So, I might see you at your sister’s wedding, High Priestess. But that won’t happen if you don’t get moving and get dressed.”</p><p>“Thank you, Lily. I really needed to hear those words.” Zelda smiles, lowering Lilith’s head to kiss her. “I love you, Lily.”</p><p>“Well, Ms. Spellman, aren’t you just lucky that I love you too?” She winks before she disappears again.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0046"><h2>46. Chapter 46</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>#spoilers for season 4 ep 2</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Lilith? What are you doing here?” Sabrina Morningstar asks, rubbing her eyes tiredly, surprised to see the mother of demons already dresses and ready to start another infernal day. “It’s too early,” she groans.</p><p>“Ah, I just learned that your Aunt Hilda is getting married today. I thought you might want to see it?” She offers nonchalantly.</p><p>“My Auntie Hilda? And Doctor Cee?” Sabrina asks, sitting on her bed quickly, before realizing she won’t be allowed to be there. “But I cannot go, there would be two of us and all that mumbo jumbo about creating a paradox… It will be too risky, unless….” She says eyeing Lilith.</p><p>“No,” the demoness states with a horrified look on her face. “I know what you are thinking, Sabrina, and I don’t think it’s a good idea.”</p><p>“Come on, Lilith! Just get there with a mirror so I can see it,” the Queen of Hell pouts. “Get in and get out before Aunt Zelda can kill you, and everything will be all right,” she says, sad puppy eyes included.</p><p>“Sabrina…” She tries, for the sake of being the difficult one. “I don’t think…”</p><p>“Please, Lilith. It’s what? Half an hour? I promise I won’t call upon you tonight, at all. Whatcha say? Around one hour of torture for an entire night of freedom?”  the blonde grins, presenting Lilith with a handheld mirror. With a sigh, the demoness grabs it roughly. “All right… but I swear to you Sabrina Morningstar that if I survive this and you end up calling me to babysit your wedding night… I’ll kill you myself.”</p><p>“No, you won’t.” Sabrina smiles and pecks Lilith’s cheek. “You like me somehow. Go, get yourself ready for the wedding.” She grins. Turning around, handheld mirror in hand, Lilith smiles. ‘Teenagers, they can be so predictable,’ she thinks.</p><p>Around the same time, Zelda stands in a circle with a few members of her coven inside the desecrated church they still haven’t used for their own Order purposes. This wedding will be the first ceremony held here. But they are there, so Ambrose can give away pictures of who they thought it was the “Uninvited”.</p><p>“Now, out… I need to start the ceremony before the mortals arrive.” Zelda instructs, once pictures were given and instructions agreed upon. The little group walks away from the High Priestess, who with little preamble takes her dagger out, and starts tracing the circle that will keep them protected inside the church walls.</p><p>“So… what’s going on?” Theo asks as he reaches the church, wondering if they would need help, and find Zelda Spellman walking in a circle with a dagger pointed to the ground while saying words, he didn’t understand at all. Whatever she was saying, it didn’t sound like the Latin Sabrina used to spew whenever she was doing her magic tricks.</p><p>“As the High Priestess, Sister Spellman is starting the sacred space, and adding some protections. She will call upon the elementals, maybe the Guardians of the Watchtowers, and then she will summon our Triple Goddess, Hecate,” Nicholas explains to the mortal boy. “Cool, right?” He asks, watching as the energies rise around the Directrix, while she called forth Fire, Air, Earth, and Water.</p><p>“It’s beautiful,” Ross adds besides them, getting a confused frown from all three boys around her. “You don’t see it?” She wonders. “I do, they might not. We witches see things differently. Perhaps it is your cunning skills that allow you to see them too,” Nick says.</p><p>Inside the church, Zelda’s magic created a bubble of energy that glows with unbounded power. Shimmering in thousands of colors creating a colorful dome that raised from the circle she’d cast. There won’t be much decoration for the mortals to see, but for the magical beings that would take part in it… It looked bafflingly gorgeous.</p><p>Looking upwards, the High Priestess allows her magic to fill the circle with her powers. “Hecate, I summon thee!” she shouts. Closing her eyes, Zelda continues in perfect Greek, “Mother, it’s I, Phiona, who calls you today. Keep us from the terrors of the outside world, Mother. Help me please, to make this day memorable for my sister.” She whispers.</p><p>She opens her eyes and walks to the beginning of the aisle where Sabrina and Nicholas would stand. With her dagger, she draws a rectangle, creating a portal to allow people inside the safety dome she had created for this. Her only hope was it didn’t backfire on them, keeping them trapped inside if things went wrong.</p><p>Soon, both sides of the desecrated church filled with people. Hilda’s side, a not so colorful mix of the darkest colors of the specter plus some weird-looking witches, chattering softly, not paying attention to the other side that slowly fills to the brim with mortals.</p><p>Doctor Cee’s side took over all the other available colors, as they talk loudly while keeping their eyes fixated on the strange mix of family and friends of the bride’s side. Cerberus had explained to his guests that Hilda’s family was a bit on the eccentrical fringe -she and her sister own a mortuary, he had added- yet he felt quite comfortable around them. Seeing Pesta and Sycorax, those who knew him understood why he felt as much at home with his bride-to-be family. They too seemed to love a good costume.</p><p>At the altar, standing by Zelda, Kenny Krosgrove looks quite dashing in his formal suit, even when his jacket has a flowery pattern. The redhead is about to roll her eyes at him when he gasps for air. She feels it then, her little sister’s magic entering the protective bubble she had created.</p><p>As if on cue, music starts, and her own eyes became watery pools. “She looks gorgeous,” Dr. Cee whispers. “Indeed, she does,” the witch agrees easily with that statement. While closing the portal, keeping them all sealed inside the church.</p><p>Soon, the bride is standing side by side with her groom and the music stops.</p><p>“Family, friends, loved ones, welcome. We are here today to witness the union of Hilda Spellman and Doctor Cerberus,” Zelda says, using the names they asked her to use. Besides, no one on Hilda’s side would have a clue as to who Kenny Krosgrove was. “We are here to celebrate with them and see them as they proclaim the bond their souls have created.”</p><p>“For those of you who might not be familiar, our Handfasting ceremony it’s not your traditional wedding. But what are these two if not untraditional? As we stand here, we recognize that, as life, love is dynamic, and thus, it changes, and so every couple is unique as the souls bound together. Today, Hilda and Cerberus have chosen to commit to one another for the rest of the mortal life.”</p><p>“They both understand they are committing to a dynamic and fluid love, and what we celebrate is the eternal connection of their souls. Joining them beyond the limits of their physical form. But let there be no mistake. While in nature love is dynamic and fluid, no one must enter the hand binding light-heartedly. This ceremony will bind your souls eternally, whether your bodies are no more. With it, you are committing to be a partner to each other, and honor your soul’s connection to one another. Knowing this, Hilda, and Cerberus, is it your intent to enter this commitment to one another?”</p><p>Sharing a teary smile and a happy shrug, the couple answers at once. “It is.”</p><p>“Then let us begin. Sabrina… The handfasting cord.” The blonde teen brings a box that contains a weaved colorful cord that Hilda and Dr. Cee had been working on since setting their date. Zelda wants to roll her eyes at how colorful it is, yet it is fitting for them. “Facing me, stand side by side and raise your hands at the same level,” she instructs as she grabs the cord.</p><p>Then she falters. The image of her own wedding bringing all sorts of nightmarish thoughts to her mind. Until she feels it, she feels Lilith’s magic just outside the closed bubble. With a deep breath, she lets her in and covers her magic to keep her hidden from the rest of the magic folk.</p><p>“Zelds?” Hilda prods since the High Priestess seems to have entered some sort of trance. “Hum, Zelda?” She tries again.</p><p>‘<em>Think it’s just us, darling. Think it is just them in here.</em>’ Lilith’s voice says in her head. The redhead frowns. Yes, they both are very powerful witches, but this is the first time she hears her Lily in her head, and telepathy is not something either of them had displayed before. <em>‘Go on, all eyes are on you, love, and you look positively divine,’</em> the demoness continues.</p><p><em>‘I can’t, Lily. I… my … memories...</em>’ she tries, even her mind is a whirlwind of terrifying memories. Until she feels a wind-like caress on her cheek. ‘<em>You can, darling. I know you can. Because you know what it feels like, don’t you? Look at her, at your sister looking at her beau. You know what it’s like… To watch someone with those bright eyes and be consumed by this raw emotion that tells you that you shouldn’t be even a breath apart. To have your blood burning with this feeling that everything will be all right as long as you are together, holding into each other for dear life. You know… Because you felt it underneath your skin, Zelda… You know this because that’s the way I felt it underneath mine. You can do this, love; because, you feel it deeper than they could ever feel... I know, because, you shared it with me.’</em></p><p>The redhead takes a deep breath as goosebumps raise over her body and she holds a smile in.<em> ‘Thank you, darling. Somehow, I know you will always be there for me or at least, move Hell to try.’</em></p><p>“Zelds? Honey? Is everything all right?” The blonde Aunt wonders, placing her lowered hand over her sister’s and bringing her back from her frozen state.</p><p>“No,” the Directrix says quite sternly. “This is not right, Hildie.” She continues, and she sees Ambrose and Sabrina’s widened eyes and the tears that well up in her sister’s eyes. Marie stands up to intervene too, but Zelda continues. “You’ll see… You are starting a new life, Hilda. Filled with purpose and ... love. You cannot enter it with old customs that carry a weight you don’t need,” she says, lowering their hands again.</p><p>“But... Zelds?”</p><p>“You don’t need the old ways to break you too,” the eldest Spellman whispers with a teary smile of her own, that carries so much grief that Hilda searches for her hand and squeezes it reassuringly. With a grateful smile, the redhead stands tall once more.</p><p>“Hilda, Cerberus… Face each other, not me, because it’s to each other who you will be bound to,” she exclaims. As they do, Zelda continues. “Hold your lefts and your rights together, to form an infinity with yourselves. That will bind you for all eternity.” Confused for a second, the pair does as requested.</p><p>“Cerberus, will you cause her pain?” Zelda asks, her stern eyes falling upon his, and he reads the veiled warning she throws with it. “I-I may,” he answers truthfully but gulping out of fear, nonetheless. “Is that your intent?” she continues. “Never,” the man says with such honesty that Zelda can’t help the smile she gives him.</p><p>“Hilda, will you cause him pain?” The redhead asks softly. “I may,” Hilda whispers, then bites her lower lip, shuffling awkwardly on her feet. “Is that your intent?” </p><p>“No,” the blonde answers steadily. “Will you share each other’s pain and seek to ease it?” She asks then, “Yes,” they say at once. Zelda smiles and drapes the cord around their hands for the first-time bind. “Then let the binding be so,” the redhead states firmly. Her words sound loud and powerful to her own ears and there’s a surge of energy that takes the breath away from all the presents. Even if they don’t quite understand what produced it.</p><p>“Hilda, will you anger him?” The High Priestess continues, not even noticing the effect of her last words. “I may,” she shrugs more confidently now. “Is that your intent?” The redhead continues. “No,” Hilda answers firmly before Zelda asks the same to Cerberus, getting the same answers.</p><p>“Will you take the heat of anger and use it to temper the strength of this union? Will you share your laughter? Will you look for the brightness in life? And will you rejoice in it together?” She continues. “Yes,” the couple says as one. With a half-smile, Zelda wraps another round around their joined hands. “Then let the binding be so!” She states again. Her voice seems to boom into the room, and the energies rise wildly, as Zelda’s magic plays with Lilith’s, even though they aren’t binding to each other as the day of the exorcism.</p><p>“Will you burden each other?” Zelda asks then, not giving them time to think about how there’s a howling wind taking over the closed church. Or how lilies and blood-red roses are blossoming around them. The High Priestess won’t even begin to wonder why there are pomegranate trees on each side of the room, filled with fruits that ripe as they appear. “I may,” they answer as one. “Is that your intent?” the redhead continues. “No.”</p><p>With a smile, the eldest Spellman continues, “Will you share the burdens of each so that your spirits may grow in this union? So that the two of you may grow together? Will you share your dreams and work to fulfill them? Will you be equals in this bond?” She finishes with trembling words, remembering the results of her own failed union.</p><p>“Yes,” they both answer at once, and the Directrix grins. “I couldn’t have asked for more for you, sister, than an equal,” she whispers then to Hilda who smiles brightly at her. “Then let the binding be so!” she exclaims and the church walls tremble with the power of it all as two souls join under the combined energies of Lilith and Zelda.</p><p>With little more than a thought, the redhead looks up and finds the brunette staring at her, and for some reason, the next words just flow out of her as if they were part of it since the beginning.</p><p>“These are the hands that will work alongside yours, to hold your family as one, and they will give you strength when you need it the most. These are the hands that will passionately love you, they will cherish you through the years, and its touch will comfort you like no other.”</p><p>“These are the hands that will wipe countless tears from your eyes, they will be there for you when you fear, and when grief fills your lungs and leaves you breathless, they will bring life into you taking the weight, reminding you of their unending care.”</p><p>“These are the hands of your best friend that, full of love for you, now promise you to love you today, tomorrow, and forever. And even when wrinkled, pained and aged, these hands will still reach out for yours, and give you the same unspoken tenderness with just the smallest of the touches.” Zelda gulps.</p><p>“Cherish them,” she says, loud enough to be heard. By the time she finishes her words, there’s not a single eye left without tears. ‘<em>I love you, Zelda,’</em> Lilith tells her telepathically, ‘<em>I love you, Lily,</em>’ she answers back. As she takes a deep breath to keep her own emotions at bay.</p><p>“The knots of this binding are not formed by these physical bonds but by your vows,” Zelda says, touching the cord and magically sliding it out of their hands without untying it. She moves their hands so their lefts are facing upwards and place the cord in them. “Either of you may drop these cords, for as always, you hold in your hands the making or breaking of this union,” the High Priestess adds, and grabbing the cord again, she places it in the box it came.</p><p>“The binding ceremony is now complete!” Zelda says, closing the box with a sound that reverberates throughout the room. “We will now seal your bond with the exchange of the rings,” She says. “The ring is a symbol of devotion, fidelity, and eternity. It’s a circle with no beginning and no end, it’s endless and eternal, just how you vowed your commitment to one another would be. So, now as you slide the ring on your partner’s fingers at the same time, for you are equals in this union and in the eyes of all who witnesses this day, and repeat after me.”</p><p>“I promise on this day, to share your pain, your joy, your burdens, your dreams, to help you navigate the maze of life together, as equals, as our love grows with us,” Zelda says, and they repeat after her.</p><p>“Hilda, Cerberus, having proclaimed the bond of your souls together in front of all these witnesses of your love. For the strengths of that bond, and by the powers vested in me as the High Priestess of the Order of Hecate, I now pronounce you… married.” She grins. “Please seal your bond with a kiss.”</p><p>As her little sister kisses her husband, Zelda scans the room in search of her love. She cannot move from her spot and fall into a much-needed embrace, but at least she knows her Lily was there, giving her strength. While the roses, lilies, and even the trees fold into themselves, disappearing in the same way they had appeared, the redhead thinks that one day -perhaps- they will manage to join in this way too, as the energies lower from their height.</p><p>There’s one more locked glance with the demoness that sends a pleasurable chill down the redhead’s back, with an ‘<em>I’ll see you tonight, dear.</em>’  Right before a hand brings her back to the state of the ceremony.</p><p>She shakes herself. No one can’t go out since they are still locked inside her bubble, and she’s glad she can control her elements masterfully, and thus, she doesn’t need a dagger to open it. Without further ado, she opens the portal to allow everyone to go out. It’s Lilith, the first one out of the bubble, and inhaling deeply, the redhead watches her disappear back to Hell.</p><p>For now, they still have lots of work to do, and that’s obvious when she finds out that’s Mambo Marie’s hand, the one that was placed over her arm while Hilda and Cerberus walk away from the aisle and towards the exterior. “Magnificent, Cherie. I’m surprised, those words weren’t in the script you had before…” She says placing a kiss on her cheek.</p><p>“Thank you, Cherie, but you should get to Dorian’s. I still need to close this circle, and this might take a while,” the redhead excuses her. “Non, Cherie… It’s a dangerous time to be left alone. I’ll wait for you outside.”</p><p>Zelda nods in agreement, already turning around to find her dagger. They wait until there’s no one else inside and no mortals on the premises, and finally, Marie steps away, allowing her to close her circle.</p><p>“Thank you, Mother, for keeping us safe. For allowing her entrance when I needed her the most. Thank you, Mother, for blessing Hilda’s union. Thank you, mother, for being here for us. Now, I … Phiona, bid you farewell.” She whispers to Hecate, before bidding farewell to everything she summoned, and finally, she undoes the circle with each step she takes, her energy gets back at her until there’s nothing left inside the church and everything is once again where it belongs.</p><p>She takes a deep breath before she walks out. “Ready, Cherie?” Marie asks, offering her an arm, and she nods in agreement. “Ianuae magicae,” they say at once and appear at an empty room at Dorian’s.</p><p>The party is in full swing, and of course, that’s where the next terror will appear. It’s not only Sabrina’s drunken speech but the Uninvited ruining the day. But there Sabrina comes, half-drunken and still able to pull some cards from only Hecate knew were. Coming out with an invitation to Hell in exchange for their lives.</p><p>And of course, it’s Zelda who is charged with removing memories from mortal minds to keep them unaware of how an incubus was roaming around the males of the room. Or how a guest appearing out of the blue in the middle of the room, and the unfiltered comments about incubus, demons, or how she managed to “transform” the nice-looking man into the wreck with a simple raise of her hands and a ‘stranger reveal thyself’.</p><p>Or how the stranger had introduced his hand into Dorian’s chest, taking his heart out and eating it, killing the only man they all knew to be almost immortal. Or how her niece had disappeared with the uninvited without logical explanation after announcing she would go to a party in Hell. Or how her nephew had touched Dorian’s body and with a quick ‘lanuae magicae,’ they both disappeared too.</p><p>She sighs then and pinches the bridge of her nose before taking a deep breath. “Please, everyone just stop!” There’s more to her words than she thought herself capable of, as the entire room stands still. With little thought about it, she nears the mortals, makes them sleep -that will be a far better excuse to how she could stop them all-and goes around the room replacing their memories with something easier to understand.</p><p>Then she unlocks the witches of her coven, the groom, and Sabrina’s friends. “Please, everyone, remain calm. We have too many mortals unaware of our delicate situation around us. I’ve already deleted their memories until the song that was being played before the incubus made its apparition. I will need you, children, to get back to the stage and finish the song you were playing before the fiasco.”</p><p>“No problem, Ms. Spellman.” Theo grins, feeling a bit embarrassed that he hadn’t thought about how weird he was feeling. “It’s not your fault, Mr. Putnam. Now, let’s continue this as we wait for news from Hell.”</p><p>“Are you sure, Zelds? Shouldn’t we just cancel this?” Hilda asks. She had already heard about the ‘cool special effects they used at the ceremony, to grow flowers and trees to add on to the ambiance. Almost like magic.’</p><p>“No, sister. There’s nothing we can do. Besides, it will be easier to let the party dwindle than to trying to come up with an explanation as to why we canceled it.”  She explains quickly.  “Right,” Hilda agrees.</p><p>“Whenever you are ready, children,” Zelda says, and as the band plays, she wakes the mortals up. All the time wondering what could be happening in Hell and worrying about her niece and her love trapped in that realm with the Terror.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm sorry if any of you is a witch and do know how you would go about these ceremonies. Mine it's just a combination of several things I've learned throughout the years and well, some heavy research xD and them some more almost cringeworthy loving words</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0047"><h2>47. Chapter 47</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm sorry it's taking me so long to post... life is quite hectic at this moment and will be until Sunday. After that, I hope I will be able to finally sit down and swamp you with this one until we are done :D<br/>For now... enjoy this one :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>To Zelda’s mild discomfort, -she still pretends she likes her- Hilda invites Marie back to the house with them. ‘To help you plan for storming into hell,’ her little sister says kindly while raising two thumbs as a sign she approves. The redhead can’t help but hope that’s all the voodoo witch tries that night.</p><p>Yet, as they arrive at the Spellman Mortuary, bride and groom in tow, they see Sabrina coming down the stairs. So, when Hilda says she wants what she had insisted she wanted for her wedding, the High Priestess can’t help but give in.</p><p>Adding to her chagrin, she has to find a costume for something she likes and truly; she doesn’t like any. It’s Ambrose’s suggestion for her to try pretending to be a witch. ‘Won’t it be a bit ironic?’ he offers, and she rolls her eyes and mortified, the High Priestess dons a costume of what mortals believe a witch looks like, including a long red wig.</p><p>Hilda actually chuckles at seeing her and, hugs her tightly, and emotions choke in the redhead’s throat as her little sister lets out an ‘I always knew you did love me, Zelds,’ for her ear only.</p><p>Then the worst happens, the dam cracks open as Hilda says her vows to Cerberus. The usually stern and composed Zelda Spellman breaks since she can’t help but remember Lilith’s words in her mind. She tries not to, -it’s embarrassing to break like this- yet, she cries. Marie tugs her to her side, but it’s not the voodoo witch’s hands that she wants all around her. No… not at all.</p><p>When everything seems to be fixed, and her family now has ammunition to mock her for the years to come. Hilda and Cerberus return to the town for their wedding night and Marie transports herself to the Academy. They know what has happened to the Uninvited (trapped inside the yellow room, outside of time and space), but Sabrina doesn’t really disclose much more about it.</p><p>Zelda tries to pry, but she has never been good at subtlety with her niece. She is direct, and too often, a bit too brusque. However, her niece just surprises her by embracing her tightly and crying her heart out. Contrary to popular beliefs, the redhead is very good at consoling her niece once her own stern front is thrown out of the window. She pats the girl’s back and coating her with a warm sense of safety-ness. But beyond tears, there’s nothing much that she gets from her niece.</p><p>“Sabrina, I’m not proud to say that you and I… We are too much alike. You should be more like your Aunt Hilda. You should be able to express your feelings and deal far more overtly with your emotions. I guess, it’s my fault that you even had a role model as guarded as myself,” she sighs.</p><p>“It’s…It’s not that, Auntie Zee,” Sabrina starts, sniffling her tears. “How can I explain to anyone what I feel like, Auntie? I’ve memories none of you have. I saw you die in the entrance hall. I saw a world without Auntie Hilda, a world where Ambrose went crazy trying to survive… It was awful and I was… Alone,” the teen cries again. Taking a deep breath, the eldest Spellman moves back slightly and clears the tears that had fallen on very young cheeks.</p><p>“You will never be alone now, Sabrina. You have family, you have friends… You have your entire life ahead of you. You will experience loss and you will experience love again. It just takes time, darling. A time you do have because you are not only half a witch, but half an angel and half a mortal. Yes, the math won’t add up to that, but you were never less or more special than you are today. You are you, Sabrina… and believe me when I tell you, we wouldn’t want you in any other way as long as it is you.”</p><p>With the back of her hands, the teen clears her tears away and gives her auntie a sad smile. “I guess you are right, Auntie. I just wish it didn’t hurt.”</p><p>“If it didn’t… How would you know if what hits you next it’s worthy?” Zelda asks, thinking in her own experiences. “The bad only helps us to treasure the good. Now, let me make you a sleeping tea, and when morning comes, we can revisit this subject if you need so. All right?”</p><p>“Thank you, Auntie.” Sabrina smiles. It’s not ten minutes later than the redhead closes Sabrina’s room door after tucking her niece in after too many months without doing it herself. It seems fate, too. Since the moment she closes the door, she feels her body becoming energy and out of a sudden, she appears in the room of her little cottage. “Lilith.” She smiles.</p><p>“I checked the mirrors at the mortuary and noticed it would be easy to transport you, love. I hope you don’t mind.”</p><p>“Never. Will you tell me what exactly happened in Hell with the terror? Sabrina only mentioned you trapped it inside the dollhouse,” Zelda says and for the way her Lily flinches, she knows the words that will come won’t sit well within her. “You won’t like what happened, so won’t you just accept something happened and come to bed?”</p><p>“I need to know,” the redhead says, but walks to the bed and sits beside Lily on the bed. “I thought you would say something of the like,” the demoness sighs. “She came to Hell, and the Sabrinas made a plan that ended up working. Sometimes I wonder how that girl is so damn lucky. Anyhow… the plan was to find a way to lure the Uninvited to cross a threshold that would guide him inside the yellow room. They did it, trapped him and we all sealed the house so it’s safe. Lucifer absolutely refused to have the thing there or the Sabrinas seeing each other again,” the brunette finishes with a sigh.</p><p>“What was the plan?” Zelda asks, squinting her eyes. “W-what?” Lilith tries, but she gets ‘the Directrix Spellman,’ looking at her. Sighing, she continues, “Well, she, somehow, convinced the Uninvited that they were both alone and … he … she… they got married.”</p><p>“You mean to tell me that my sixteen-year-old niece married an Eldritch terror?!” Zelda shouts and the mother of demons shakes her head. “Didn’t I say you wouldn’t like it? According to them, there was no easier way to lure him into the yellow room.” Lilith says, and it’s Zelda’s turn to sigh. “Are you angry?”</p><p>“No, not really. Just exhausted... At this pace, I will be grateful if we reach Sabrina’s seventeenth birthday alive. I’ll throw a party if we do it in one piece,” the redhead says. At this point, Zelda has no idea how ominous her words truly are.</p><p>“It is not so bad, love.  At least we have some time together,” the demoness says, grabbing her hand and giving her hand a soft squeeze before reaching up and cupping her darling’s cheek, she kisses her. “I have the entire night for ourselves,” the brunette whispers.</p><p>“Lillith…” Zelda sighs, pushing the demoness's shoulders away from her. Lily smiles.</p><p>“Darling, I understand you want to be as far away from our child as you possibly can,” She says, ignoring the look Zelda gave her at the mention of ‘our child,’. “But I’m dying to worship you, to kiss you senseless, to taste every bit of your skin, knowing that I might not get another chance. So, please Zelda, will you let me love you?” Lilith finishes biting her lower lip.</p><p>Zelda looks at her for a moment. Then, she reaches up for her sharp cheeks and kisses her slowly. “I won’t stop you, Lily, as long as you don’t ask what I still can’t give you,” the redhead says against swollen lips.</p><p>“You once waited for me, until I was ready, Love. It’s only fair that I wait until you are ready too,” Lilith smiles.</p><p>She pecks soft lips and starts trailing kisses and bites along Zelda’s jaw and down her neck, and true to her words the High Priestess doesn’t stop her as she goes south. No, she enjoys it greatly, undulating hips searching for friction, writhing in pleasure under expert lips and magical fingers that leave nothing to the imagination but a raw need and all sorts of feelings. The redhead comes with a half moaned and half groaned, “Lily,” that sends shivers down the demoness back.</p><p>It isn’t enough for Lilith; she won’t ever have enough of Zelda, and she knows this. But this will be it, for now, she decides as she kisses her way up until reaching lips that bear the mark of the redhead’s own teeth. She pecks them, barely a caress compared to their most passionate ones. Yet, it bears even more emotions than others.  Whereas they filled some with unbridled passion and lust. This one just drowns Zelda in Lilith’s care for her. The Directrix understands then how much they really respect each other, giving themselves time to grow, change, and evolve while being together. Doing them individually and dually while life moves on, pushing them to new situations, they might not have control of.</p><p>“I love you, Lily,” Zelda says, nuzzling the brunette’s neck. “Please, don’t ever doubt that.” She whispers.</p><p>“I know. I don’t. I just wish you would believe in me when I say this child is yours. I feel it yours.” The demoness answers in the same manner. There’s a teary smile on the redhead’s face, and a hand raises to touch the sharp edges of the mother of demons’ cheek. “I know you want it to be ours, Lily. Believe me, I understand it completely. But… It can’t be… I’m just your regular witch and as one of those… I can’t create a life by myself.”</p><p>“I’ll find the explanation, Zelda. I swear to you I will figure it out. Now, sleep, love. You needed it and I really want nothing more than to hold you as you do.”</p><p>When she wakes up the next morning, the redhead finds herself in her own bed at the mortuary. The eldest Spellman survives the next day, the first one without Hilda in sixteen years. Then the next one and the next one, until she simply can’t take it anymore.</p><p>She doesn’t want to sound desperate or annoyed. But it’s also been the same amount of days since she last has seen Lilith and days of Marie trying to get more from her.</p><p>Zelda shakes her head. Once upon a time, she was so good at change. She was simply free, and she used to do as she pleased in whatever time or way she pleased, and now… Now, she felt stuck, afraid of change. Rooted in her place, trying to survive as everything moved around her. She wonders if that’s what Sabrina was feeling or trying unsuccessfully to express the previous night. Then she shakes herself off it.</p><p>It’s the knock on the door that night that confuses her. Certainly, that wasn’t in her plans at all. “Rosalind? Sabrina is not home.”</p><p>“Yes. I know, Ms. Spellman, but I’m not searching for her... I… can we talk?” She asks, making the redhead worry about a myriad of potential issues this mortal can talk to her about. “Of course, Rosalind,” the High Priestess says and walks her to the office. She’s highly surprised when none of the many options she considered are out of Rosalind Walker's mouth.</p><p>“You said you bestowed the cunning into my ancestors, is that the truth?” Roz wonders, and Zelda sighs. “You are a seer, Rosalind,” she says, extending her hand for the mortal to touch.</p><p>“Are you sure? I have no control over what I see…” Roz warns as she looks at the offered hand. The redhead smiles. “I do have control over the past I will share, although, you might feel it too real.”</p><p>As she leans in to touch Zelda’s hand, the redhead takes it away for a second. “Just remember whatever you feel, it’s not you. Understood?” The High Priestess asks again. There’s a small nod coming from the mortal before the witch allows her to grasp her hand.</p><p>Heat. The flesh of her wrist was tightly bound, painfully scrape by the harsh rope over sensitive skin. The way her shoulders are hurt by the way she’s hanging from her binds. An all-consuming rage that burns hotter than the heat that is slowly raising under her feet, and then … she sees it. Her. The woman who betrayed her trust, hiding in the arms of the man who she thought she had loved.</p><p>She takes a deep breath as red flames lick the skin of her legs, her favorite dress disappearing in slow combustion taken over by a fire that shines almost like her own hair. More heat, and the stickiness of her sweat that tries in vain to keep her cool but fails miserably. Her lips cracking under the sheer need for water, as her body gives it away freely to try to maintain the temperature while slowly killing her in the process.</p><p>Words leave her mouth in quick succession,-Roz doesn’t know the words being said in a language she hasn’t heard before- yet she knows the woman she is feeling is hexing them all, she can feel it in the surge of energy radiating from her body.</p><p>When her eyes fall onto the man, she sentences him to the slowest of the deaths. Burning him as he sentenced her to die, yet inside out so there’s no help for him. She sees him, screeching in pain while trying to fight it. It makes no sense to anyone else since nothing was happening on the outside. Until flames came out of him, even when they tried to pour water on him, he only burned again.</p><p>Yet, that’s only happening to the side of her sight now. Her focus is fixed on the woman who looks terrified at who it seems was the object of her affections.  “You! You are doing this. Stop it!” She shouts, pointing towards her and she feels herself smiling.</p><p>“You have seen the world. You have learned about life. You had my trust, and you abused it. Now, you’ll pay.” She says. The woman doesn’t notice that the voice is in her head. “From this day on, darkness will fall upon your eyes and the eyes of all those who come after you. Hear my words. Every time your descendants reach witch’s adulthood, slowly they will lose their sight, and with it, they will gain a cunning vision that will make them different. Mark my words, all the members of your family will suffer for your betrayal, and there won’t be anything you can do to stop it.”</p><p>“No. I won’t have any descendants, and your curse will die with me!” The woman shouted. She laughed, “Oh, you believe in heaven too much not to, my dear, you already are with child. You have condemned your child for your own idiocy, and you won’t be allowed to die until you birth it.”</p><p>The last sound the villagers heard from her was her laugher, as she vanished from the pole and into somewhere safe.</p><p>But that’s not all Roz sees. She sees Lilith (She knows it’s Lilith, even though she still wears a resemblance to their teacher).  Rosalind sees two black graves, yet she can’t quite make up the names on the stones. She sees a child with one blue eye and one green. Then she sees the Spellman’s sharing a family moment, and gasps for air as the High Priestess takes her hand away. The image that confuses her the most, though, is watching as Marie changes into some weird-looking man.</p><p>“Everything all right?” Zelda asks as the teen pinches the bridge of her nose.</p><p>“I… Yes. I’ve seen…” Zelda raises her hand, stopping her. “Unless you’ve seen the next eldritch terror. Premonitions, as most readings about the future, are a way to prepare you for what’s about to come. Whatever else you’ve seen, if it’s my future, keep it to yourself. I won’t risk changing it.”</p><p>“There’s…” She starts but then shakes her head. “I… You made my family seers.” She states confusedly.</p><p>“As I’ve told you before, yes. I gave them a gift and now you know how it came to be,” Zelda sighs. “I hope it wasn’t so painful, it tried to keep feelings out of the equation, but when they are so deep it’s not always possible. Do you mind?” The High Priestess asks as she searches for her cigarette.</p><p>“It was ... I could feel it, but I knew it wasn’t me, even if rarely I was you.” She frowns in confusion because, in most of her experiences, she sees what will happen, yet in this one, she was Sabrina’s Aunt.</p><p>“You were in the past, the only way to be there with your skill-set was being me,” the redhead leaves out her smoke.</p><p>“Oh... I get it. But there’s something I don’t understand. Marie allowed me to see my … met-tet?” The High Priestess stops mid-movement, observing the girl. “Your spirit guide,” Zelda agrees.</p><p>“Yes. My nana Ruth. She said we aren’t cunning women. We are witches. So… we were witches before?” Sabrina’s aunt leans back in her chair, closing her eyes and pinching the bridge of her nose.</p><p>“I…What I’m about to disclose can’t leave this room, Rosalind. Will you agree upon that?” The Directrix asks, eyeing the girl. “Yes, of course.”</p><p>“There was no magical trace in your ancestor when I took her under my wing. Certainly, I did teach her to work with some physical magic, however, even as I cursed her there was no magical trace in her… When I met her again, there was a trace of magic… mine.”</p><p>“And I?”</p><p>“It’s my magic what you possess, Rosalind. I gave it away as a part of the curse.” Zelda says. “What did Marie do for you to see your Nana?” the redhead asks after starting another cigarette and taking a drag.</p><p>“I felt like I had an eye … here…” the mortal says, touching her forehead. “It makes sense,” the High Priestess nods, letting the smoke go. “That’s the placement of the third eye. Allow me to help you see what I can’t express with words.” Zelda offers and waits until she has confirmation from the teen. She places her hand on Rosalind’s forehead and removes the veil softly.</p><p>“Sabrina mentioned you saw the protection circle I’d cast inside the church. That means you’ve seen my energies before, what you haven’t seen … is yours…” she says standing up. “I won’t touch you again, so please, walk with me.” The Directrix instructs until they are in a guest room standing in front of a mirror, and Ros sees it. The tremendous energetic field that surrounds Sabrina’s aunt shines in the same shade that the thin one surrounding herself. Zelda waves a hand over the mortal’s head and the energy vibrates differently, mixing with Zelda’s own because it’s hers.</p><p>“I think I understand.”</p><p>“No, you don’t,” Zelda states. “You Rosalind Walker are not a witch. I am. You carry in yourself my energies, and the gifts you accepted without my curse. You see what I see. Or what I would see if I stood in your shoes. Now, I don’t know why Marie has come searching for you, but I need you to follow whatever lead she gives you. I’m afraid we might be facing a hidden enemy that’s not fully showing her cards. Can you do it?”</p><p>“Yes, of course.”</p><p>“Also, I’ll remind you once more that you agreed for this truth to be kept between us. By all means, be a witch. It’s safer for both of us,” Zelda finishes. “You should go, Sabrina will be here at any moment now and it won’t do any good if she sees you here.” She waves her hand once more, and Ros stops seeing energetic fields. “Believe me, it’s better to navigate a world when you don’t see them all for their energies. It’s enough that you can see beyond the veil as it is.”</p><p>“Thank you, I suppose,” Rosalind says and smiles. “Whenever it becomes too much to bear, feel free to come searching for me, and I can take it away. It shouldn’t become a burden over your shoulders when it’s mine where it’s supposed to rest.”  With a quick nod, Rosalind Walker heads out.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0048"><h2>48. Chapter 48</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Another morning goes by with no further issues. The world seems to be a quiet place since the arrival -and departure- of the Uninvited. Until that afternoon, as she feels Lilith’s energies like a whirlwind of chaos right at the academy’s doors.</p><p>It surprises the High Priestess, not because she wasn’t expecting to see her there -or how suddenly Lily seems ready to pop the child out when a few days early she wasn’t nearly as advanced.-  No, what surprises her is the havoc of energies she feels coming from the demoness when she’s usually even more controlled than Zelda herself is. Never quite giving away the extent of her powers so, if anyone tried to outsmart her, would still face the wall of her magic.</p><p>“Lilith? What’s this about?” She asks, noticing the minion, and since they are very good at keeping appearances, the High Priestess assumes he doesn’t know about their more intimate arrangements.</p><p>“Please, Sister Zelda, help me. My baby is coming.” Lilith says, even when she wants so badly to say ‘our’.  That, and she’s ready to jump out the appearances out of the pain it’s threatening to rip her apart. The Directrix understands the extent of the pain the brunette must be suffering, if only for the way her magic is uncontrolled. Added to the unbalance of energies, Zelda knows she must help.</p><p>“Baby? What baby?” the redhead asks, even when one should be blind not to notice the size of Lilith’s bump.  Yet, that’s what she would’ve asked if she didn’t know.</p><p>Lilith wants to growl because her next words must be let out, even if they are such a blatant lie. “Lucifer’s, but it’s coming too soon.”  The demoness feels torn between regretting her choice of words or not. On one hand, Prudence Night walks out in that same instant. And how could they explain to Blackwood’s heir that the baby on the way it’s Zelda’s? When Zelda herself doesn’t believe it? However, on the other hand, she has Zelda. Her love, who finally seems accepting of Lilith’s fate. Of her pregnancy.</p><p>The redhead throws instructions over her shoulder to Prudence, as she hurries down the stairs to help her love. “I told you I would help,” she whispers to the demoness, as she helps her enter. “Your minion must remain outside,” she barks.</p><p>“Go back to Hell, Minion. I’m in good hands.” Lilith growls and begrudgingly her aid disappears. Zelda grabs her by the waist, supporting her weight as much as she can from the angle they are in. By the time they reach the deep end of the foyer, Hilda is already there. “Oh, love.” She lets out, “Are you sure you want her in your room upstairs?”</p><p>“Is it ready?” Zelda questions, and her sister nods. Yet, before Hilda can add anything else, the redhead places her hand over her sister’s shoulders, and they appear in the room. “How?” the blonde wonders, but there’s no answer as Lilith screams in pain, and the eldest Spellman help her settle.</p><p>“What’s?” The little sister asks again, and it’s the demoness who answers her between pants. “I mated with Blackwood while Lucifer was joined to his body, to be with child so I could preserve my life until his birth. It’s his son.” Lilith whispers, trying not to feel embarrassed about them. The brunette knows she’s breaking Zelda all over again. Even when she knows that the last words she has said are nothing but a lie.</p><p>As Zelda’s room fills with the women of the coven. A memory strikes the redhead’s mind out of the blue. One of her, grasping both of Lilith’s hands as she rocks them, as they birthed their child into the world. This time, when she looked up in her memory, she saw Hilda and the young women of her coven surrounding them, and a man where Marie was standing. ‘Could it be?’  she considers but shakes her head as her Lily screams. The High Priestess convinces herself that’s just wishful thinking, mixed up with a dream.</p><p>She sees her love suffering and she can’t take it. Without further ado, the High Priestess calls upon Hecate and request that Lilith’s pain be shared, so the child could be born and the mother survive.</p><p>“Push,” the High Priestess keeps repeating like a mantra, even if the pain is tearing her coven insides. As her Lilith pushes out Lucifer’s spawn into this world. Somehow, she and Hilda are spared of the pain that crippling their coven and Zelda feels torn by it.  It’s a chance, albeit painful- to feel what is like to carry a child to the portal of life, and yet, once again, she’s deprived of it.</p><p>“Zelda, it’s coming,” Hilda says, and the redhead stretches. The High Priestess feels her heart beating wildly in her throat as she sees the baby as it’s coming out.</p><p>“I see him, your son,” she says… “He is…” she trails off because she can’t continue. Not when Hilda raises confused eyes towards her. The coven is still painfully writhing around them, and they can’t see it. Zelda shakes her head, and somehow her sister understands what she doesn’t say. “He is beautiful,” she finishes as Hilda covers the tiny legs of Lilith’s daughter, and enveloping her tightly on a sheet, she walks to the demoness.</p><p>As Lilith grabs her child, she notices his eyes are still closed, and her blood still covers him. “A perfect little devil,” Lilith says. “Thank you, sister,” she adds for a good measure, looking at the Spellman’s at the end of her bed.</p><p>“Can you take over?” Zelda asks her sister, since birth still hasn’t finished, and Hilda nods. Wondering what’s going on in her sister’s mind. To the demoness's utter surprise, it’s Zelda, the one who grabs the child next; and disappears to her bathroom with the child. The next contraction leaves her with no time to question where she’s going or why is she taking their child away.</p><p>After cleaning it and checking if he is healthy, Zelda takes the baby to her office, wondering what the heavens she will do with it now. It’s a girl, a beautiful girl with clear eyes and soft hair.  Yet, she finds herself in the same conundrum that months ago, when she doubted Faustus's ability to keep his daughter alive. Lucifer already has one, a second one, has no use to him.</p><p>Taking a deep breath, she creates a bassinet to leave the babe on, and then the High Priestess transports herself to what looks like a mostly abandoned place and follows the wails. There are at least ten babies in there. One surely would do, she thinks. Finding one that might fit, she kidnaps it and prays to Hecate she’s doing the right thing.</p><p>Now, there are two babies in her office.  A magical one and a mortal one, and she remembers her conversation the previous night with Rosalind Walker, and wonders if that might work to deceive the great deceiver.</p><p>She shares some of her magic into the tiny body, enough to morph it into a similar energetic field that she sees coming from the girl. It’s a mirage, an energy glamor the High Priestess has practiced several times during the previous days whenever she needed to hide Lilith’s power from the members of her family. With that done, the eldest Spellman takes the now magical mortal baby and transports them to the bathroom of her room.</p><p>Looking around, she sets the tub that Lilith will need to clean herself after the bloody mess they left in her room. Zelda sighs, “there’s no rest for the wicked,” she mutters and gets out of the bathroom.</p><p>“He’s perfectly healthy and is now clean,” Zelda states and lowers the child into the bassinet that waits for him there. Then helps Lilith to the bathroom with a simple levitation spell.</p><p>Hilda might have not noticed the glamour over the kid, but she knows. The moment the babe wets ‘herself’ and she sees a boy and not the girl that came out of the demoness. She knows her sister did something to the babe, but she says nothing, though. Zelda has a top-notch intuition, and the blonde knows whatever her sister has done, she’s done it with the best of intentions.</p><p>“Zelda Spellman, what did you do now?” Hilda inquires, after following Zelda to her office once the demoness was all settled in her sister’s room. “Oh, no… not again, sister. You got to stop kidnapping children, Zelds! Wait, who was the other one? I couldn’t feel a difference until I saw the difference.”</p><p>“It’s a mortal boy, I took him from a forsaken adoption center. I’m sure we most likely saved him from a life on the streets.” She shrugs.</p><p>“Why?” Hilda wonders then, arms crossed, and a conflicted expression on her face.  The redhead sighs, “you’ve heard her, Hildy. She said she’s only alive because Lucifer thought she was bearing his son. Do you really believe the rat bastard will give her a respite if he knew it was a girl?”</p><p>“No… but, Zelds? How did you do it? How did you make a magical being from a mortal boy?” Hilda frowns. Zelda lets herself fall into her chair. “I’m not sure myself, sister. I’m not sure it will work or hold. Perhaps, all I’ve done is placing an innocent child into harm’s way.”</p><p>“It is a mortal, they perish anyway,”  Hilda tries to lift her spirits. The redhead sighs, finding her cigarette holder, and lighting one, “indeed, but what to do with this one? How we care of her with the current state of our lives, Hildy?”</p><p>“Well, I can take her to my home until we figure it out, sister. You can visit her there, and we will need to place a lot of wards around the coffee shop until you decide what are you doing with her. You just can’t keep her at the mortuary again. It’s not fair for Ambrose and Sabrina,” the blonde says coming close to her older sister, who for once looks exhausted and it’s not covering it.</p><p>“I know. Take her, Hilda, and return ASAP. I hope, Cerberus won’t mind caring for her for a few hours?”</p><p>“Oh, no, he loves kids. Sadly, we won’t have one of our own,” Hilda shrugs. “Yes, you will. But perhaps it’s better if you settled as a couple first. Wait a year, or two?” Zelda says, grabbing her sister’s hand. The blonde feels a warm current coming out of her sister’s hand and smiles. “Yeah, two sounds like a good amount of years before we try. Doesn’t it?” Hilda smiles.</p><p>“Go, sister. The child can’t be kept here much longer. It’s too risky.”  Hilda disappears and Zelda rubs her face tiredly. “What have you done, Spellman?” She wonders, but there was something in the baby’s cry that made her protective of the child she had all but rejected from the start.</p><p>And as Hilda appears back in the office, Prudence storms in. Quick words about a vision from Ros and the Kings of Hell coming for the baby, have Zelda realize she did the right thing. Even if she still doesn’t know how they will manage with the child when they too are constantly under siege.  She looks towards Sabrina’s friend and the girl nods as if confirming what the young witch was saying before, and breathes too since Rosalind's magic is hers, but there’s also an energetic glamour on it that no one has noticed. The glamor that makes Ros ‘a witch’ under Marie’s eyes.</p><p>With sure steps, the Directrix walks towards the front door and opens it. Standing outside, one arm placed on her hip, the other raised as she smokes, her body angled in case she needed to be more physical. There was a crackling energy clouding around her. Everything surrounding Zelda Spellman screamed ‘aggressive’. Like a lioness protecting her cub.</p><p>Noticing the approaching shadows, the redhead waves her hand and the front doors are tightly closed behind her back. “What do you want?” She says as the two remaining Kings appear below her. “We seek an audience with Lilith. We want to pay tribute to her baby.” </p><p>“Lilith has our protection. I will take this interruption to her and see if she wants to come out and receive your tribute,” the High Priestess snickers before turning around, the doors opening at their own volition. “You are not welcomed inside.” Her voice booms as she walks in, and the doors close by themselves behind her.</p><p>“What is it, Zelds?” Hilda asks as she sees her sister striding towards her room… Lilith’s room. Prudence, Marie, Hilda, and Rosalind follow hurriedly behind. “Tributes my ass! They want to kill her and the baby.” She grouses before knocking on the demoness’s door.</p><p>The group finds the demoness sitting as if she hasn’t just painfully delivered a baby, her entire demeanor regal as she sits tall with her baby in her arms.</p><p>“What is this about?” Lilith asks as she assesses her darling that stands with her hands on her hips, in a defensive stance that makes her want to kiss her once the demoness understands the reason behind it. “Pay tribute? They are here for one reason, and one reason only, to kill my baby. The baby you just delivered, Zelda Spellman.” ‘your baby,’ she wants to add, but for now, having her love protecting them with all the fierceness she’s displaying is enough.</p><p>“Very well,” the redhead states and Lilith can see the glimmer of something else inside the green pools she adores. There’s love, and then there’s this rage simmering underneath it all, and then there’s this protective streak that she has seen before, but not in this light.  Whereas before was all sorts of tender, this one tells the demoness that the redhead is prepared to kill if needed. “Let’s give them the welcome they deserve,” the Directrix adds with a smile Lilith hasn’t seen before, one she doesn’t want to ever see again.</p><p>“Prudence, get the women, we will need them,” the High Priestess instructs, and the witch disappears quickly towards the rooms. “Rosalind, you’ll sit this one out. Hilda, Marie… come along.” The redhead doesn’t leave room to doubt as she marches towards the front doors. Not when it’s Lilith, the one in danger. Not when there’s an innocent child in that room.</p><p>“Lilith won’t see you. You must leave,” she states the moment she is outside. Raising her chin, showing she’s not scared of them in the least. The women standing beside her clench their jaws, readying themselves for whatever the High Priestess will do next.</p><p>“We won’t leave,” Beelzebub says, taking a step closer to Zelda, who approaches too. “State your business, Kings,” she says then. She rejects their gifts even when they mention Lucifer himself. She wants to tell them that if he was so damn worried about his child, he could’ve come himself. But Asmodeus makes a mistake, “we won’t leave without the baby,” he says.</p><p>Zelda takes one step closer, sizing them. “Then we have a problem,” she says. The Kings dare to laugh at them, even when they have no clue about what they are facing. But they are demons, Zelda knows, and demons are annoying and like to think witches can’t destroy them. They are so wrong, she thinks. “Sisters,” she says and feels her coven’s energy rising to join hers that was already being lifted since she stood up outside the first time as she waited for their arrival. Closing her eyes as they move at once and she starts her hex.</p><p>“Angustia parientis corrui,” they say, raising their hands and the Kings writhe in pain, spewing blood until Asmodeus drops dead, and a damaged Beelzebub teleports back to where he came from. “Well, Lucifer was bound to find out sooner or later,” Zelda says as they lower their hands, once they are both gone.  </p><p>“Girls gather the coven, I won’t make this decision on my own,” the redhead says later, as a few of them are already moving the demon’s body to the back and others are ready to end their days.</p><p>As she makes her way in, she sees the petrified mortal girl standing at the top, Zelda places a reassuring hand over her shoulder. “You cannot do that, Rosalind. However, you are protected, you are one of our sisters, and we will do that for you if there’s a need.” The redhead states. “Hilda is far better for comforting,” She throws over her shoulder as she enters the Academy again.</p><p>It’s not even ten minutes later when the entire coven is waiting for her in one of the many rooms that comprise the academy. “Coven, we have Lilith and her child in one room in this very same building. Some of your sisters have helped me protect her and her child from Kings of Hell. That most likely means that a war will be brewing. I have already denied her asylum once without bringing this decision upon you. Now, we’ve balanced it, by helping the demoness with her birth and defeating the Kings. It’s up to this coven to decide if we extend our hands and offer her our hospitality as our Dark Mother would want us to, or if we ask her to leave.”</p><p>“What could mean if she stays?” Melvin asks. “We already survived a lot, but … what if we can avoid something bad happening by not allowing her to stay?”</p><p>“Melvin, love, we are already in danger with the chance of the terrors appearing out of the blue. Besides, haven’t we defeated Lucifer once? When we were not half as powerful as we are now with our Dark Mother protecting us?” Hilda says surprising Zelda.</p><p>“Let’s vote. I will cast mine only if there’s a tie. Those in favor of Lilith’s remaining under our coven and Dark Mother’s protection, please raise your hands,” the High Priestess instructs. Soon, there a few hands that are still doubting, and it’s Ros who intervenes, “I… I know I’m not even part of this coven, I’m not a witch in the way you are, but I’ve seen it. She will help if we help her.” The seer states, and then the previously doubting hands raise at once.</p><p>“Great! Then team up and add extra protection wards around every window and door. Let’s seal this place with our magic. Hilda, I’ll keep my office open so you can transport in and out.” She whispers to her sister while trying to keep herself composed. Truth is, she feels this bubbly energy raising inside her, knowing that her coven will protect her love at all costs.</p><p>And Lilith… the demoness can’t help the smile that blossoms on her face once Zelda offers her their hospitality. Even if that means her own room at the academy will be lost to the demoness, and that their own meetings will be even more cautious and almost completely severed if not under the guise of some menial care towards the child. </p><p>“Zelda?” She calls after the child has bitten her. The redhead had stopped by the door as she hears the ‘ouch’ the demoness lets out. “Yes?” She says turning around.</p><p>“What did you do?” Lilith inquires squinting at her. “I didn’t do a thing you wouldn’t do,” Zelda lets out, “besides helping you with your birth, your baby, and your hellish issues.”</p><p>“No, there’s more. What aren’t you telling me?” The demoness lets out and the redhead sighs. “It doesn’t matter, Lily. What is done is done.” She states. “<em>I love you, Lily,</em>” the High Priestess adds using the new psychic link they seem to develop at odd times. “<em>I love you, Zelda,</em>” comes in the same manner. With that, the redhead finally leaves the room towards the office.</p><p>It’s Rosalind who she finds in her office, and for a split second, she wonders if she’s done wrong by telling her the truth about her powers. “Ms. Spellman,” Ros starts, “no one saw me enter. Ah, Marie and Prudence asked me to wait for them, but as I was walking in front of your doors…. I saw… I know you said you didn’t want me telling you about your future, but what if it’s the baby’s future?”</p><p>“Tell me,” Zelda says, moving to find her cigarette and lighter. Her hips resting against her desk. “I saw you taking it to someone, Gray… Gre..”</p><p>“Gryla?” The high priestess offers, and the girl nods. “Yes. With some reluctance she takes her, and that’s how the child survives. This one, the one with Lilith, he won’t survive unless your sister gets him out of the way before the six hours reach their end.”</p><p>“Thank you, Rosalind. That’s helpful.” Zelda nods. “Ms. Spellman? Who’s the other child?” She wonders.</p><p>“No one of your concern, child. Now, go. Before they figure out you aren’t where they left you. If you see my sister, please tell her I’m searching for her.” The mortal nods and walks away from the office, leaving the High priestess to her thoughts.  Until there’s a knock at her door.</p><p>“Zelds? You were searching for me?” She asks poking her head in. “Yes, sister. I believe I found an answer to my conundrum. Let’s visit that husband of yours, so I can safeguard the child.” She states, standing and walking towards her sister. Grabbing her hand, they appear at their little place on top of the shop.</p><p>“Cerberus,” Zelda greets as she finds her brother-in-law with the child in his arms while cooing at her. She can’t help the brief smile that graces her lips. “Thank you,” the redhead says as she takes the girl in her arms.</p><p>“What are you going to do, Zelds?” Hilda asks, worried about her sister and the baby. “I’ll take her somewhere safe,” she winks and disappears out of thin air.</p><p>“Can you do that?” Cerberus asks, looking at the space that remains where Zelda Spellman was standing before.</p><p>“No. I didn’t know she could, either. Not without an incantation,” Hilda says. “Maybe, it’s the baby.”</p>
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<a name="section0049"><h2>49. Chapter 49</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Guess who finally got some time to write?!<br/>Enjoy!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>As she opens her eyes, she finds herself in the middle of an unknown forest. There is a cacophony of children’s laughter that breaches her ears, and it’s then when Zelda knows she is in the right place.</p><p>“State your business, Zelda Spellman,” Gryla’s voice booms from all around the High Priestess as she feels children tugging her clothes and poking around her. Inhaling deeply, the redhead cradles Lilith’s baby girl tighter against her chest, “I need your help, sister,” she then shouts to the trees.</p><p>“My, my… You, searching for help... Twice in such a short time… I could get used to this,” the blonde says as she walks out from behind a tree. “What’s in this for me?” She asks and then she notices. “Are you fancying a competition? Stealing babies is my thing, Zelda Spellman,” the witch laughs and shakes her head. Amused at seeing the stoic redhead cradling yet another baby.  </p><p>“I gave you a place to stay, Gryla. My coven is your coven. It’s you who walked out of our walls this time. We helped you birth your last child, and we took care of all of you while you were there, living among us,” Zelda states calmly with no animadversion.</p><p>The tall blonde crooks her head, “We both know the woods are safer, especially now,” she adds. Nodding in agreement, Zelda gives her a small smile. “Indeed, they are. That’s why I am here, Gryla. I need you to take this child and protect her as if was one of your own, sister. I can’t keep her from her father. I can’t protect her from him…” The High priestess states sadly, and the blonde witch walks closer.</p><p>“You know how it goes, High Priestess. I can claim the child as my own if the babe does not relate to you,” the blonde witch says as she takes some steps closer until they are standing almost nose to nose. The Directrix clenches her jaw tightly. However, even before she can accept or deny the witch’s warning, with the softness of a mother, the blonde touches the baby’s cheek. “I didn’t know you were with child, Zelda Spellman,” Gryla frowns in confusion, and the redhead does it too.</p><p>“I am not with child and this babe it is not mine. It’s Lucifer and Lilith’s spawn,” Zelda grouses. “We are keeping the first witch safe inside the Academy walls. We tried keeping her child safe at my sister’s home; however, we can’t protect both the baby and Lilith if Lucifer comes to find them. The baby is far safer in the woods than it will be there, at the academy, or even in my home. Believe me, these words aren’t easy to say,” the High Priestess states with a defeated tone.</p><p>However, and as if confused by the news, the tall blonde frowns again. “But her energies…” She starts, yet the hedge witch knows Zelda Spellman is (and all the Spellman, really, are) as stubborn as they come. So, if the High Priestess negates her daughter, for a reason that is yet to be disclosed, then who is Gryla to fight what she senses? The stoic woman that Gryla used to know before has changed enough to accept them and embrace them as sisters, and she is nothing but grateful to have a family-a coven- after so long. “If you say this is Lucifer and Lilith’s spawn, and both mother and child are under your protection, Zelda Spellman, then I will take care of her as if she was one of my own.”</p><p>“Name your price, if there’s one,” Zelda requests then, and the hedge witch crooks her head. “I want the truth,” she starts, but then she notices the redhead has no clue or is not seeing what she can sense. “When you know it,” she adds. “And I want to be her night mother,” she states in an afterthought.</p><p>“I’ve told you nothing but the truth,” the High Priestess states, standing tall. “However, for some reason, you sense there’s more to this than I’m aware of. If there are some lies entwined in my version of the truth, I’m not aware of them. I promise you, sister, the truth is all I’ve told you.” The redhead states.</p><p>The blonde raises her eyebrow, “ah, yes, that might be the truth as you know it now. When you know it fully, I’ll want to learn it from your lips,” Gryla continues.</p><p>“Very well, then. As for the night mother, that’s Lilith’s place to give.” The directrix states. “I’m sure she won’t be against it when she knows you took great care of her child.” Surprising her, the blonde shakes her head, “you truly don’t know, do you? All right, but if it is in your hands?”</p><p>“Then you’ll be her night mother.” Zelda agrees. “Anything else?”</p><p>“Dine with me, before you part, sister. The woods can be very lonely when there are only children to care for,” the witch states waving towards the back where her little cottage is barely visible to the trained eye.</p><p>“You can always come back to our Academy… Not now, when this child and yours might be further endangered…but in the future. You can always summon me when you feel alone and need someone to talk with,” the High Priestess offers her and shocks herself at the sincerity of her words. She knows what’s like to be alone and has no one to share the burdens she carries. Even when she has Hilda, the Directrix has never fully dropped the weight over her little sister’s shoulders. Instead, she has just shouldered more responsibilities to take over the space that loneliness left inside her.</p><p>“Are you offering a friendship, Zelda Spellman?” Gryla asks, feeling both amused and touched by this as they walk the short path that takes them to the front door. “You will care for a child I brought to your hands, and you will return her to her mother when the time comes… A friendship is the least I could offer you, sister.”</p><p>“I’ll like that. You know, I always thought you were too damn stuck up. But now, I realize you aren’t quite what you sell, are you?”  The blonde says. “Please, sit. My casserole is ready.”</p><p>“Very well then.”</p><p>It’s almost an hour later when Zelda finally gives the babe to the witch, and she feels something tugging inside her chest as she watches the girl in the other woman’s arms. It’s Sabrina, Leticia, and now this child…. And it leaves the redhead to wonder why is it she wasn’t ever blessed with a child of her own.</p><p>It’s not like she doesn’t consider Sabrina her own, it’s the fact that Sabrina loves her as if she almost was her mother, and it both pain her and streaks her pride to be considered just enough. However, in everyone else’s eyes, she’s just a spinster… And the Goddess had blessed even Gryla.</p><p>With the last wave, she turns around and walks out of the cottage, and transports herself to a place where she feels safe. Allowing her tears to fall fat and heavy from her eyes, taking over her actions like a summer storm.  Zelda slides to the floor next to her bed at her cottage and embraces her legs tightly. The redhead longs for her Lily to come and comfort her. Yet, how can she explain to her love what she’s done when or if she learns it? When it could easily create the first spasm that will tip the castle of cards that the High Priestess is tenuously placing over a quaking table.</p><p>So, she cries until there aren’t more tears to shed, and cleanses herself with a bath. Then she covers herself with a glamor that won’t allow anyone to see how truly devastated she is for, once again, having to part with a child that’s not quite her own, but that somehow has stolen her heart as quickly as the child’s mother had.</p><p>Moody. That’s the way her niece and nephew refer to her for the following days. It doesn’t help that the academy it’s filled with the boy’s cry now and then. Or that Lilith seems unable to shut him. It makes sense, though, it’s not her child, and she’s not his mother. Any other baby would be at least as fussy as he is, and that leaves Zelda wondering how the little girl is behaving back at Gryla’s cottage.</p><p>The High Priestess only squares her shoulders, as she did with Leticia, and avoids calling Gryla to learn about the babe she supposedly hated. She also avoids her Lily as if she was the plague.</p><p>“Hilda! Go, check what she is planning to do with her life and that restless child of hers!” the redhead shouts a couple of days later. Sending a confused Hilda to the room who can’t help but mutter only her breath, ‘Goddess, the one who just had a child is Lilith, not Zelds. Why is she so pissed off?”</p><p>It’s not even half an hour later when Hilda returns to her sister’s office to share the news that they will have Lilith living with them in Zelda’s room until Adam turns sixteen. “Well, there’s some logic in that,” the Directrix mumbles, and she can’t help but feel another pang of pain as she thinks how easily has Lilith changed her version of how the child wasn’t Lucifer’s. To how she will wait sixteen years for him to claim his father's throne. But before she can dwell on it, Lucifer Morningstar himself enters her office.</p><p>“What the heavens are you doing here?” Zelda states, raising her hands in a defensive stance and waiting to see if he was going to try to claim her love and his child.</p><p>“Auntie Zee, Auntie Hilda…” Sabrina says, and two pairs of stares fall into her. “Ah… We came here to talk to you, because… well, I’m not your Sabrina. You’ll see … there’s two of us and as I kept the throne of Hell, there was another me traipsing the mortal realm,” the girl grimaces.</p><p>“Yes, it seems this stint they both have pulled has finally overthrown the already messed balance of things. I believe this is an attention call from my … father… for us to fix this divide at once,” Lucifer states, pointing towards Sabrina.</p><p>“We both know the unbalance it’s neither Sabrina’s fault. It is what it is, and it’s been like this long before there were two of them,” Zelda states, daring Lucifer to contradict her. Instead, the King of Hell frowns and grabs a little statue that the redhead keeps on her desk if only to avoid her glare.</p><p>‘This woman has a harsh glance,’ the fallen angel thinks. “You know about… the chaos?” He asks in a whisper so no one else can overhear him and watches as the redhead crosses her arms and raises her eyebrow as if challenging him to continue. But her Sabrina enters them, and Zelda finally loses it.</p><p>The High Priestess knows Ambrose knows that she is aware of the two Sabrina, but she can’t help herself. He doesn’t throw her under the bus either, which she knows she will have to thank him later. Sometimes being Zelda Spellman was a heavy burden.</p><p>“There’s one thing it remains to disclose,” the Directrix says, plopping herself in her chair tiredly while trying to pretend she’s nothing but pissed off. “What would that be, Auntie?” Ambrose asks.</p><p>“The reason both Sabrinas have decided to come clean around the same time, isn’t that obvious?” The High Priestess barks. “Right. Yes, uh… Marie called me to the observatory… It seems the realms are colliding into each other; we can only assume it has to do with the existence of two Sabrinas, that this is some way to preserve the balance,” he adds.</p><p>Zelda frowns, she knows that someone had broken the equilibrium for millennia before according to the prophecy he had read to her. So, it makes no sense to her that unbalanced forces could cause this merging. “Are we certain no eldritch terror could cause this?” the High Priestess asks then, and her nephew sighs. “We don’t know, even if it was chances truly are that the paradox Sabrina created is also helping. He… you know… <em>Blackwood</em>,” he hisses the name, “won’t tell anything about the terrors. Prudence is trying, but so far…”</p><p>“We all know the bastard won’t say a blessed thing.” The redhead huffs. “All right, let’s call them back and see if they have more information or even some helpful solution–which I highly doubt it- and be done with this at once.”</p><p>Is Ambrose, the one sent to find the Morningstars. Soon, they are back to Zelda’s office, discussing workable plans. ‘<em>Ambrose,’ </em>the redhead says in her nephew’s head,<em> ‘for this to work, you will need to communicate with all of us. I’ll keep the communication open and allow you to talk to all of us at once.</em>’</p><p><em>‘Auntie Zee?’</em> He asks in the same way, yet he only looks at his auntie briefly. <em>‘H-how?</em>’ Ambrose wonders.</p><p>‘<em>I’m not so sure myself, Ambrose. Just, pretend it’s yours or even Marie’s doing.</em>’ She states. Once he’s standing right next to Marie at the observatory, he tries a simple, ‘<em>hello? Everyone can hear me?</em>’</p><p>Two annoyed Morningstar’s answer ‘<em>yes</em>’, both Sabrina’s smile confusedly but also answer ‘yup’, and finally the Spellman sisters add a quick, ‘<em>of course</em>,’ before they begin, and fail. Soon, Metatron makes their appearance, and it’s just with the six hours announcement that Zelda remembers Ross’s words.</p><p>“Hilda, may I have a word with you?” The redhead asks, taking her to the library. “Zelds? What’s wrong? You are scaring me a bit.”</p><p>“Before this mess… Sabrina’s friend… Rosalind… she came to me and said that the only way the boy in Lilith’s room survives is if you preserve it before the six-hour comes to its end. Since that’s the timeframe the celestial gave to the Sabrinas, I’ll say that’s the same Lucifer will use before he tries to spirit away his son, and possibly try to kill Lilith. I’ll take care of keeping Lilith safe, but I cannot protect both of them. Rosalind’s cunning did say you were the one who could save the child.”</p><p>“All right, what do you want me to do, sister?” Hilda asks, nodding. Even if her older sister is quite good at keeping her emotions and expressions at bay, the blonde knows there’s something the redhead is not letting out, and that somehow relates with Lilith and the lengths she’s already gone to to keep the demoness protected. “Go see her, find out what she’ll do.  Most likely Lucifer will request seeing her the moment we inform him she’s here.”</p><p>“Okey dokey, let that in my hands,” Hilda says and turns around. “Hildy?” She stops her, “will you want me to pull your husband here for the night?” Zelda asks, because if something she has a soft spot for her family, and she knows that even when the realms are collapsing, and they could lose their niece in a blink of an eye… She’s the one that’s alone and the one who cannot seek the comfort of the only person she needs it from.</p><p>“Will it be too terrible if I go to him instead? I mean, I know you have Marie here… and Ambrose has Prudence and our Sabrina has … Nick,” Hilda somehow dares to say and winces, readying herself for the chastisement surely will come. However, the High Priestess understands that her sister can bury her sorrows and fear in the man she married, and once again she finds herself envying Hilda’s life.</p><p>“Just let me know when you are going, sister, and search for me when you return.” The blonde frowns, surprised for a while but finds Zelda’s understanding gaze uncovered from any facade that would prompt her to stay.  “Yes, in four hours and a half, so I can check up on the baby and figure out how to save him,” Hilda grins.</p><p>“Try to convince her we cannot keep her sixteen years hidden in my room!” She adds with a chuckle as the blonde walks away.</p><p>Maybe she should take Marie’s several offers, maybe it would be far easier to deal with it all having the voodoo witch in her bed, whispering reassuring words to her ear while caressing her back and hair, planting soft kisses in her neck and lips. But, no… Zelda wants the woman who is bunkered in her room, caring for Lucifer’s fake child. The one witch she has been avoiding since the day she stole her baby in fear that the brunette would figure out what she has done.</p><p>Sighing, the High Priestess rubs her face tiredly. “Long day, Cherie?” Marie asks.</p><p>“Long life,” Zelda answers, wondering if she could at least confide in this woman. As if she could read her mind, the voodoo priestess smiles charmingly. “You can tell me anything, Zelda Spellman. I won’t hold it against you.”</p><p>“I’m just exhausted, Marie. Of a world that seems to be always collapsing around us. As if we were the only ones causing all the chaos in the realms. I can’t believe the balance was so frail that a single sixteen years old could crumple it with some poorly made decisions,” Zelda lets out and the darker woman frowns.</p><p>“The unbalance?” Marie wonders.</p><p>“Yes. The realms are in chaos. You know this, Earth and Hell being absorbed into each other. The celestial realm being brought forth too… Only because two Sabrinas exists.” Zelda waves and the voodooist frown only deepens.</p><p>“Cherie, you do realize that the realms merging and the unbalance are two different things? One can be solved, it won't happen so easily but it can be solved. The other one, I’m not so sure about. It might be a terror that we cannot or do not understand.”</p><p>“What are you trying to say, Marie?” Zelda frowns. “Cherie, haven’t you read the prophecies? Are you really as blind as you seem to be?”</p><p>“I have no idea what you are talking about,” she says, and before the voodoo witch can answer Hilda enters. “Sorry for interrupting, but I … just came out of Lilith’s room… again. Lucifer gave her six last hours with Adam. He will take him then and kill her before he goes back to Hell.”</p><p>Zelda sighs and rubs her forehead. Her powers raising as rage flows inside her. “Thank you, Hilda,” she says, barely containing herself. “Give my regards to Cerberus,” she states, then waves her hand, and Hilda is gone.</p><p>“You are stronger now,” Marie states, “you are finally seeing. It is her… It is you.” She adds cryptically.</p><p>“I don’t understand what you aren’t saying, Marie, so if you won’t be of help… go away,” Zelda states almost in defeat. She feels nimble fingers raising her face and a soft kiss planted on the corner of her mouth. “Go to her, she needs you, you need her. You still have four hours, don’t you? Isn’t it worth the risk? The crucial question is, are you brave enough to take the chance, Zelda Spellman?” Marie wonders before she turns around and leaves the redhead to her thoughts and fears. </p>
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<a name="section0050"><h2>50. Chapter 50</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>#spoiler for Part4<br/>I still can't believe they really killed two kids in this part.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Restless. That’s how the events since the moment Lilith appeared at the Academy’s doors have left her. Restless and heartbroken, she must add. Having her Lily so close and yet so utterly far away is heart-wrenching, it’s like having her and not at all. Every passing second just seems to mount up over her shoulders and wrench her heart a bit more.</p><p>No one knows about them. No one has a clue as to the real reason Zelda Spellman paces inside her room at the Mortuary, debating into transporting herself for one last night, one last embrace…</p><p>She won’t cry. She can’t. The High Priestess refuses to feel anything more than she already feels and wonders, not for the first time, what would it be like to have Lilith’s feelings drowning her beneath her skin once more. As before, when things were equally in shambles, when her Lily was just Mary and their feelings flowed effortlessly underneath their skins, comforting her even when there was pain among it all. Until it is clear for the Directrix that doubting is futile. She was always better at grasping the bulls by the horns anyway, and with her next step, she’s inside her room at the academy.</p><p>The first thing she notices is how messy it currently is, when she always kept everything in its proper place, her clothes folded neatly or hung after being disposed of, and usually not a book or candle is out of place. A wishful representation of what she always wanted her mind to be, but she always failed to achieve. No, her mind usually looks quite more like her room currently looks. With things thrown carelessly around, clothes left on the floor, and bottles and creams uncapped. There’s a couple of whisky glasses mixed with the stench of baby bottles strewn around the place too, and it almost smells like her room right during those first days after Edward’s demise. </p><p>It’s a pretty accurate depiction of her own mind, and the eldest Spellman wonders if that’s how it is inside Lilith’s mind too.  </p><p>The dark bassinet it’s the thing that traps her attention, she walks to it and finds the boy asleep quite like a little devil. She snorts, it’s funny that she thinks of him like that, when he is nothing but a mortal boy that she pulled into this chaotic world of theirs. “Why have you?” the High Priestess wonders out loud, caressing the boy’s chest with two fingers.</p><p>“He is going to kill me,” a voice states in a barely-there whisper. The Directrix frowns since she can’t seem to find the owner of it anywhere until her heart crushes at the sight of her Lilith crumpled form. The usually vibrant and feisty woman, it’s not anywhere near this depiction of the demoness Zelda gets to see. No, this witch sits in the darkest corner of the most untidy room ever, with her knees pressed tightly against her chest, and hands embracing them. Completely hiding her face underneath a messy mane that the redhead has never seen in such a disheveled state.</p><p>“Oh, Lily,” she lets out and walks to her love. It pains her to see the lost gaze that finds hers, and it breaks the High Priestess heart when she raises her hand to caress the demoness hair out of the way and the brunette cowers. “It’s me. It is just me…” the Spellman witch whispers, sitting next to her on the floor. As if those words have awakened something in the other woman, the brunette all but jumps into the redhead, hiding her face in the crook of her neck and inhaling the scent she has missed so much.</p><p>“Don’t you know? It could never be just you, love,” Lilith says because no matter how broken or scared she is about what will come to happen to her in the next couple of hours, Zelda Spellman would never be ‘just her’. Not when she is all Lilith dreams about and the only one she truly has loved in all her years on the unfair Earth. Zelda chuckles at this and tries to untangle the messy hair but only finds more knots on it. Shaking her head, she teleports them all to the cottage.</p><p>The bassinet with the mortal boy appears next to the bed as they appear inside the room. Finding herself standing, the demoness frowns in confusion. “If you only saw what I see,” Zelda whispers, pecking her lips softly once. “Let’s get you ready to face him. He doesn’t need to see you like this. You are not broken and no matter how much he can try, he won’t get rid of you. I’ll find Longinus spear and kill him myself if I must,” The redhead states with such vehemence that Lilith finds herself fortified by her words. “This won’t be easy, Lily... but you, you must hold on. I know it scares you, I know you are afraid for your life… I know what it is like to be there, Lily. Thanks to you, I know what it is like to be there when there’s someone else willing to help. I want you to know what it’s like… and maybe, someday, we can hold hands without being hanging in there for dear life. For once allowing ourselves to just live. What do you say? Will you let me?”</p><p>Tears fill Lilith’s eyes and she finds herself unable to utter a word, so she nods and brings her love as close as she can. “Let’s get you to the tub. You will get out of here with the bearing of the Queen you are, love. Then we will head back to the room and fix it, so when he comes for the child, you can properly defy him.”</p><p>It’s something in the way Zelda speaks that makes her feel the fire burning inside of her. That thing that kept her going, millennia after millennia, pushing through Earth years and wars and Hellish punishment. She feels quite like herself for a moment, like the someone she almost forgot in the middle of all the things her life had thrown upon her. </p><p>So, when they are both inside the tub, surrounded by warm water and relaxing salts, it’s Lilith, the one who turns around and kisses Zelda fervently, bringing out in the younger witch’s feelings and sensations. Some that they can only scrape out of each other. The demoness feels the imperative need of ravishing the woman who knows so well how to push her buttons to make her feel anything at all, and it’s gladly surprising when Zelda responds in kind.</p><p>Bruising kisses and clashing teeth follow as they launch themselves into each other. Moans and pants follow as water splashes in rhythm with their colliding bodies. Their hands can’t seem to find enough of each other as they caress, scratch, and claw as an answer when there’s too much to feel. They come together as one, swallowing their ecstasy in one never-ending kiss filled with love.</p><p>“I love you,” they both let out at once, as if they were practicing it their entire lives, and they chuckle at it. Lovingly touching each other’s cheeks before they sigh. There’s never enough time for them to fully discover who they are or why is it so perfect because every time they are vulnerable enough something else seems to happen. This time, it’s baby Adam’s cry what warns them of the fleeting hours.</p><p>With quivering legs, they stand, and they walk to the room, magically dressing in the process. By the time the demoness holds baby Adam in her arms, they are back to Zelda’s room at the academy, and the redhead waves her hand to make it neat. Before she turns around to start what she knows will be a complex day, the eldest Spellman walks to the demoness, and places a soft kiss on the top of her head. “Everything will be all right, Lilith. I don’t know how or when, but I know everything will fall into place,” she states, and somehow the demoness knows this is a truth.</p><p>“Like the stupid unbalance?” The demoness asks, biting her lower lip, and Zelda smiles. “I believe that one is in your hands if I recall you mentioning a prophecy. Be strong, Lily. I need you, even if you think I don’t,” are the redhead’s parting words.</p><p>Back at Cerberus, Hilda also gets ready to start this day. However, she finds Rosalind. “Ross? Darling, what are you doing here so early?”</p><p>“Ah, Ms. Spellman. I had… a premonition?” She whispers, and Hilda frown confused by this. “Aren’t you supposed to disclose all of those to Marie?” The blonde asks since that’s the last thing she knew about those things. “Y-yes? This one is about you? I thought…”</p><p>“Oh, do tell,” Hilda grins, a curious smile painting itself on her face. “Ah, I saw you entering Lilith’s room… and …”</p><p>“Go on, love. I’m sure nothing you’ll say will scare me,” Hilda says. “Well, I saw you replacing a boy with a doll? But you put a spell on it, maybe? Because Lilith doesn’t seem to notice that’s not her child.”</p><p>“And you saw nothing about how I made that happen?” the blonde wonders and the teen shakes her head. “I’m sorry, I only saw you taking a boy out of her room and then bringing back a moving doll. I wish I could be of more help, but that’s all I saw in the vision where the child ends up unharmed… She might cook the babe if you don’t reach her in time.”</p><p>“Cook… the… Babe?” Hilda stammers out and the young girl nods. “Yeah, something about an eye for an eye or him feeding her an Adam before? As I’ve said, I don’t quite know the situation, Ms. Spellman.”</p><p>“It’s quite all right, dear. You should go, you are going to be late for school, and there’s only enough persuasion we can use on those teachers of yours.” She watches the girl go before she rushes to say goodbye to her husband and dials a mirror, searching for Zelda.</p><p>“Zelds?” She asks as she blinks and finds herself in the Directrix’s office. “Yes, Hilda? I don’t have all the time in the world as you might seem to believe,” the eldest sister greets. “I had a friendly chat with Rosalind Walker… She said I changed the boy for an enchanted doll so Lilith wouldn’t realize that it wasn’t her child.”</p><p>“And how do I enter this ridiculous thing you are proposing?” Zelda asks with a raised eyebrow. “Well, I thought… Since you already fixed the boy’s magical signature once…. That you might use one of Sabrina’s old dolls?”</p><p>“Why, pray tell, would I do such a folly?” Zelda growls, standing up and placing her fisted hands on her hips. “Be-because Lilith will cook the babe if we don’t?” Hilda explains. Even before she notices, there’s a doll of the right size atop her sister’s desk. The High Priestess has her eyes closed and her hand opened over the toy. A quick litany of words the blonde hasn’t ever heard before leaves the redhead’s lips in quick succession, and as her green eyes find Hilda’s, the doll on her desk moves and cries.</p><p>“Hecate, Zelds… how? I knew you were powerful but…” She stops herself from following through, Hilda reads the worry and fear in her sister’s eyes. “Thank you, Zelds. You saved a life.”</p><p>“I brought that life upon this mess, Hilda. Isn’t trying to keep it alive the least I can do?” She offers tiredly. “It’s just a mortal boy, Zelds… Not so long ago, you wouldn’t care, or you would pretend you didn’t. I like this new you… It reminds me of the sister I grew up with…”</p><p>“Oh, hush. Go bring him here so we can replace him, and I’ll take him to Gryla. Hopefully, before we have the top of Hell’s court back into our observatory.”</p><p>It’s barely a moment later when baby Adam finds himself back into Zelda’s arms, and the redhead sighs. “Take the doll. I’ll make sure he is safe.” She states and as she watches her little sister walk away from her office, she closes her eyes and finds herself in Gryla’s cottage.</p><p>“You got to be kidding,” the blonde witch states and then laughs almost hysterically. “I might start charging you, Zelda Spellman. Maybe I should get back near Greendale and open a witch’s kindergarten.”</p><p>“Well, you chose to come here,” Zelda just laughs now, because she too can see how ridiculous this might look to the witch who was known for stealing babies. “Lucifer and his cortege are due soon. I should get back,” she says, handing the babe to the other witch and giving her wrist a thankful squeeze.</p><p>“The girl is over there,” she says, pointing to a room. “If you want to check up on her, “the blonde sees the stoic Zelda Spellman hesitate. Gryla then nods towards the door, “follow me, High Priestess.”</p><p>They walk the few steps that separate them from the room, and Zelda feels as if a weight is removed from her shoulders when she sees the baby girl unharmed and peacefully sleeping in the bassinet. “May I…” she braves out with a trembling voice.</p><p>“But, of course, who am I to deny a child to its mother?” Gryla lets out, but Zelda isn’t paying attention to her anymore. She cradles the baby softly and with the tip of her finger, she caresses chubby cheeks. The babe doesn’t wake up, however, she makes herself comfortable in the warm arms, as if feeling she’s safely surrounded by them.</p><p>“Thank you, Gryla. I don’t know if this means anything to you at all but to me… It means more than I can pay,” Zelda whispers. Green eyes fill with unshed tears, and her voice cracks with the weight of emotions. She must stop to take a breath and lowers the girl back before she continues. “Please, think about your price if there’s one. I’ll call you on your mirror once they leave,” The High Priestess states before she disappears again with a new crack in her armor, and even more reasons to strive.</p><p>It’s hours later when she lets herself drop tiredly on her chair. She has helped kill a celestial… “The lengths you are willing to go for that child, Zelda Spellman,” she mumbles, taking a sip of her whisky. Overthrowing Lucifer, changing deities not once but twice, and now killing angels too. The redhead wonders for a second if she would’ve been strong enough to kill Metatron by herself. Yet, there’s something else nagging her. The way the angel looked at her while they mentioned the order of the cosmos. As if it was her fault, not Sabrina’s….</p><p>“No… It can’t be,” she shakes her head. “What can’t be, Auntie?” Ambrose asks, entering her office.</p><p>“Ambrose, you said Metatron didn’t know the future, neither they accounted for hope and love. Why you think that prophecy you once read to me was solely based on love when neither Metatron nor Lucifer seems able to feel it?”</p><p>“Well, they do not write prophecies for angels, Auntie. They escape our realm and thus, they cannot change it,” Ambrose states taking a seat, making Zelda frown further. “Yet, if they cannot modify it… How then was possible for Lucifer to create Hell, and to share his gift into this realm?” The redhead wonders.</p><p>“That I do not know, Auntie… Perhaps you should bring these doubts to Marie? Or Lilith even?” He offers.</p><p>“Right. Don’t mind me… what did you need?” She inquires. “I was coming to let you know I’m heading back to the mortuary. In case you needed something before I left.”</p><p>“Ah, no… Not really…. But Ambrose, if you find time to do so, would you check upon that prophecy and my doubts?”</p><p>“Of course, Auntie Zee.” He smiles and, unable to help himself, places a soft kiss on her cheek. “Auntie Zee, you do know that I love you, right?” he whispers. The redhead blushes and raises her eyes to meet his, grasping his hand as she does. “I do, yet I did need to hear it again.” She says squeezing his hand. “I shouldn’t be long here either. I’ll get home and we can have a family dinner. Let’s have your Aunt Hilda inviting her beau.”</p><p>“Isn’t that exactly what we all need?” He winks before he walks away.</p><p>Inside her room, Lilith paces. She had noticed something was wrong with the babe, but she couldn’t quite place it. Instead, she placed a sleeping hex over him and waited for Lucifer, hoping to bluff her way out of this mess. She knew her chances were scarce, but she would die before giving Zelda’s child to him. No, Sabrina Morningstar was more than enough for someone like him.</p><p>Zelda would survive losing a child, wouldn’t she? Especially since she doesn’t recognize Adam as her own. The demoness feels caged, noticing that they took away all options from her hands, and the only two left are impossibly painful. Give away Zelda’s child to Lucifer and die, or kill the child herself and hope to be killed. At the end of the day, knowing what Lucifer is truly like, killing the child is far more merciful than any other option that she can come up with.</p><p>The mother of demons doesn’t realize she’s butchering and cooking a doll. Not when the spell was so well done that there’s blood pouring out of the toy, and its flesh is as soft as it should’ve been if it truly was human. Her actions fill the demoness with such anguish that she doesn’t notice there’s no little beating heart as she cuts it open, just enough liquid gurgling out in a red-ish sea, staining the walls and floors. Tainting her life forever.</p><p>Soon, he’s there, claiming the child that’s not his. Seemingly suffering for a girl he neglected for sixteen years, and when he leaves, he leaves even more devastation behind him. Cursing her to a life of humanity, taken her demon side out of her.</p><p>The former Madam Satan tries to peel her skin out of her body, to free herself of Mary Wardwell’s cocoon to see the one that belonged to her, the green one that has years over centuries of being raw and abused… the one she always feared to show to her Zelda.. and it’s gone. All she manages to do is to screech in pain as her own blood pours red out of the cut she made into herself.</p><p>Collapsing into the floor, she sees the mess she’s done. Zelda will hate her now that she has finally fulfilled what they blamed her for during millennia. She had killed a child. A boy. Now that she wasn’t a demon anymore, she felt even eviler than in all the years she had lived before.</p><p>“What have I done?” she cries, and in a panic attack, she cleans all remains of what had happened that night. She even finds herself a doll that will resemble the child she slaughtered. No one comes close anyway, no one would be the wiser.</p><p>When the next morning comes and Hilda enters her room, she’s quick to dismiss the young Spellman and her quite assertive questioning line. She still isn’t sure why hasn’t she just given her the child to care for, why she had killed and cook it. Him… Zelda’s baby… but she knows, deep down, she knows that there’s truly no outrunning the Dark Lord, and less when he is mourning.</p><p>A capricious thing that fallen angel is. Willing to give away a girl and burden her aunts with raising her as half mortal-half witch, if only to expand his power. When he already had everything, when she had already given him her everything. When Lilith had bonded every ounce of her magic to that stupid book she created, and every magical being that followed her steps had given him more power to wield than he needed. Yet, here she is… nothing but a witch… a battered, bruised, broken witch and she doesn’t know she can survive this one. She doesn’t know if she can survive Zelda’s broken heart when she learns what she’s done with their babe.</p><p>For the first time in her life, Lilith hits rock bottom, and she doesn’t want to survive anymore. </p>
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<a name="section0051"><h2>51. Chapter 51</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>So many chapters! Soooo many words! But we are getting closer to the end... I hope...<br/>Enjoy!</p><p>All comments are greatly appreciated :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Trays of food that are sent remain untouched until they replace them in Lilith’s room at lunch, teatime, and diner that day. The former demoness’s appetite is gone along with her sanity. How could she eat when she feels the guilt closing her throat and anguish traps her breath somewhere inside her body? Yet, despite her brokenness, the mother of demons has the mind to spill the few bottles they’ve sent for the baby. The brunette will pretend everything it’s fine until she has no other choice but to break Zelda too. For that, she hopes years if not centuries of reprieve. Hope to leave out that awful truth when the boy will be nothing more than a distant memory of yet another infant that the High Priestess helped birth… She hopes. But her life has always shown her the wrong side in the unmerciful days that comprise her eternal life.</p><p>The first witch has no clue that the blonde sister is waiting for her to chew her head out for having replaced the boy with a doll. Hilda keeps hoping that whatever was the spell that Zelda used on the doll would last enough to replace him before Lilith notices it. The youngest of the Spellman’s sisters doesn’t want to be around the moment they inform the first woman that the boy is mortal, and her rightful daughter had been in Gryla’s care since day one. No. She will let that to the responsible of committing such acts if she can.</p><p>So, none of them really questions the other’s actions. One hiding a babe she killed and the other one keeping a secret that might cost her, her life -and truly, Hilda has been killed too many times already to be the bearer of that news- so the blonde is happy to survive that day, and hopes the next day brings a solution to this stalemate of sorts.</p><p>With a quick ‘Ianuae magicae,’ Hilda transports herself to her home, not before finding Marie and inviting her over for the family dinner they had postponed the previous night since they were all too tired then.</p><p>Dinner goes by smoothly. Cerberus couldn’t join them, but to Zelda’s dismay, Marie does. Even then, she plays the perfect hostess, and when they move to the parlor, she takes over the loveseat, doubling herself to take most of the space. They enjoy a quiet nightcap as Sabrina tells them about her school day.</p><p>But nights can’t be all so perfectly calm at the Spellman’s Mortuary. It seems it’s some sort of universal law that -since Sabrina’s baptism- their most calm nights ought to become perfectly dreadful in a matter of a blink of an eye. So, they truly aren’t quite surprised when the front door rattles, taking away the perfect stillness of what would otherwise be a normal night.</p><p>Standing up, the High Priestess walks to the front door. Marie and her family follow suit. Clenching her jaw, Zelda opens the door, ready to face whatever might come next. She finds nothing until she hears a whimper coming from… her familiar?</p><p>Vinegar Tom was once the best thing in Zelda’s life. The beagle goblin had found her quite like Salem had found Sabrina, six days before her dark baptism. Her friend had lived a long life by her side, and she had deemed him her confidant… her soulmate. So, having him back makes her heart swollen with the love she had thought long gone and there’s nothing else in the world that can take this away from her.</p><p>Yet, amid the attention his family is giving to the dog, Ambrose notices the way Marie’s expression changes at this recent development. The fear etched in the voodoo witch it’s palpable for the crowd in their foyer, and they don’t quite understand why she seems to be taken by this new terror.</p><p>“Oh, crap. We’re not even done with the Cosmic. Now the Returned?” Sabrina lets out after Marie explains herself, all wide-eyed and fearful. “Sorry, Vinegar Tom is an eldritch terror?” Hilda asks incredulously.</p><p>“All of the Returned are, and they must be faced and fought on multiple battlefields,” Marie adds. As the voodoo witch adds more cautionary words, Zelda worries.</p><p>There are plenty of ghosts that the High Priestess would rather not see ever again, including their parents. But there’s one that would both make her feel ecstatic and terrified… Especially if, as the vodouisant said, they aren’t who they seem, and they might not know everything that happened. So… that one of them could be Edward Spellman, and how her deepest, darkest secret could be let out by his ghost petrifies her.</p><p>Yet, she hides her fears on the supposed attraction she and Marie share. Pretending to worry about where the woman heads or why she’s the one facing the Revenants’ avatar. The Voodoo priestess knows, though, that it’s just an act and gives her a reassuring smile, and squeezes Zelda’s hand softly. “There are things we must do on our own, not all of us are lucky to have someone else to complete the tasks that were bestowed upon us so long ago,” Marie says cryptically before she leaves.</p><p>Of course, it’s just her luck that the moment the High Priestess steps into her office to start her day the following morning, that is Edward Spellman, the one she sees inside seating in her chair.</p><p>“Bro-brother?” She asks in a breathy whisper. The redhead wants to rush in, hug her dear brother, and ask him a million questions; however, he only raises his gaze for a second or two. “I am not your brother,” he states harshly before he lowers his gaze back to the books on the table, and the Directrix fights the tears that his words created. The stabbing wound straight to her heart, as the one who had accepted her with open arms now denies her so brutally. She swallows her pride and the tears and just basks in the idea of having him for a moment even if he isn’t quite himself.</p><p>It’s then when Sabrina finds them, and she wants to tell her niece that this is her father. That there’s nothing wrong with him, yet she knows… Zelda knows that Edward in there it’s not the brother she had no matter how much he looks like him. It’s a mirage, a reflection of the terror to torture the living. Instead, she introduces her as a student and hopes that her very stubborn niece will understand why there’s a need to keep him unaware that she’s his daughter.</p><p>No matter how many things she ought to do that day, and how many classes she was supposed to teach, Zelda stays in her office staring at her long-gone brother as he works as if in a trance. The fear that he will disclose more than the statement he already let out weighting in her shoulders.</p><p>In her room, and unaware of the current terror, Lilith hears a baby crying, and she assumes is the one she killed. Her Adam. Zelda’s boy coming to haunt her from his afterlife. It makes sense, it’s a life that never saw the chance to fulfill whatever he came to this world to fulfill. In her despair, the former demoness remembers something of the last night she had to spend with her love before she had killed any chances of a future together.</p><p>“The Spear of Longinus. If it can kill Lucifer, it certainly can kill me…” She thinks, but Zelda’s image comes to her mind. “No, she has Marie… she will get over me in no time… besides, who would want to be with a pedicide?” Lilith wonders, clearing her tears with the back of her hand. No matter how much she knows the redhead loves her, she also knows there’s no hope of ever being forgiven for her last sin. No, she caused this, and she would end it.</p><p>So, the brunette walks to the academy’s sewing room and gathers all she needs to make a puppet of the one person she knows will help her even if it’s out of the hatred he feels of her. Later that day, she summons Caliban.</p><p>It’s late that night when Zelda leaves the office and when she returns, she finds Sabrina being attacked by Edward. The High Priestess has no doubts as to whose side she is on and quickly stops Edward from harming the girl. She waits until Sabrina is out of the room to place him under a potent spell that will leave him contained. Hopefully, that will make her able to help her niece and maybe even relax a bit. Zelda sees Sabrina, and that girl has always been a chink in her armor. Now, even more, with her big bright eyes filled with tears.</p><p>“Auntie, it was awful,” the teen states. The redhead can’t help but get close to her. “He said horrible things to me… including that he wasn’t my father,” Sabrina finishes with tears rolling down her cheeks.</p><p>“Edward said that?” Zelda asks, and wishes she could tell her niece that he didn’t mean to, but if the words are out… He surely must have thought about them or considered them for a while. Otherwise, why would they be out now? Or perhaps, that’s exactly how the terror works, bringing out the opposite of that thing they believed during their lives? The High Priestess files her questions away for Marie. “And the terrible thing is, he’s right.”</p><p>In days like this, the redhead is surprised by the strength of the girl she raised as her own, and it’s clear to her just how much the teen had matured in the past months. Now, at barely days away from turning seventeen, she’s capable of accepting this blunt truth that was thrown at her, intending to harm her. Zelda wants to add some motherly advice, tell her how much she can relate with her, but before she finds the courage to let her truth out to her needing niece, the phone rings and cuts her out of it.</p><p>Another day goes by, and The Returned remains. The High Priestess wonders what acts Marie is doing to defeat the avatar of the Revenants since she seems to take her sweet time. She’s keeping Edward asleep, she has no clue what Hilda and her Dr. Cee are doing to keep his mother at bay, and Prudence has informed her that Dorcas tried to kill Agatha. They have no clue who else could roam Greendale because of this last terror.</p><p>Morning comes and goes before Lilith finally gets her hands on the spear. She’s both thankful and terrified by her next movement. Her final one in the game she never really learned how to play, falling from the first woman and witch, the “gem of creation” to a betrayed woman shredded into million pieces by the ruthless life that came in the hands of Lucifer. And now… back to the woman, with her powers gone in the one punishment he had never dared to enact in her before. ‘A life of misery,’ he said, ‘humanity.’ As if she hadn’t had both all the while.</p><p>She walks to the statue of Hecate, hoping that a sacrifice is what it’s required to quench the wraith of her babe and spare Zelda from the pain. Praying that Zelda’s Goddess will be merciful -as her own father wasn’t- and allows her to die when the spear finally pierces her old, broken body.</p><p>If the Goddess had eyes, she would’ve rolled them at Lilith’s next words. “Hecate, give me the strength to do what must be done,” the former demoness says, hands raised in prayer before she grabs the spear, and that’s exactly what the Goddess provides.</p><p>“Lilith!” Zelda exclaims entering the room after feeling an apprehensive need to visit the statue, only to find her love with a dagger in her hands and kneeling in front of it. “What are you doing?” The redhead asks, her heart racing in her throat as a myriad of ideas rush in her mind. The High Priestess can’t help but wonder if she would’ve survived walking into this room a moment later to find a stabbed Lilith bleeding away. She doesn’t dwell on it, the image painted in her mind too painful to even consider it.</p><p>“An atonement,” Lilith answers, as she thinks how she will explain this to her love without using the words she doesn’t want to let out. “Sister Zelda,” her voice breaks, “I am haunted by the dead.”</p><p>Zelda relaxes at this, thinking this is just the brunette exaggerating as she’s so prone to do from time to time. “Oh, as are we all,” she lets out. “I have one of the Returned locked in my office. Even now, Mambo Marie is squaring off against the terror’s undead ally, Lazarus,” Zelda continues walking closer to her, hoping she will be able to stop the spear to break into the body of the woman she loves if necessary.</p><p>“Lazarus? The resurrected man is here? In Greendale?” Lilith asks, her entire demeanor changing as she stands. It relieves the High Priestess when she notices how the first witch lowers the spear, too. “He’s behind all of this, and until Marie defeats him, the dead will keep coming back,” the redhead says.</p><p>The mother of demons smiles. Maybe she can try to stop him, to convince him to keep the baby’s cry from driving her crazy. If not, perhaps she could kill him and test the effects of the spear. “Do you know where the Resurrected Man is?” She asks, a new gleam in her eye that the High Priestess can’t help but notice.</p><p>“Yes, of course… But I want answers first, Lily,” and there’s that something in Zelda’s voice that she can’t quite deny. “Why you want to go? What did you were thinking of achieving here? What is this?” the redhead lets out at once and touches the spear to get her point across.</p><p>“This is the Spear of Longinus. I thought I might give you the certainty that this can end up any immortal lives, Lucifer’s and mine included. When proven, your fears of him coming back for you, your coven, or Sabrina, could be easily eradicated with it. Now, since Lazarus is here, I thought I could try to plea a bargain.” Lilith offers.</p><p>“By killing yourself? You thought I would be able to do anything at all if you killed yourself?” Zelda asks in a whisper, her hand finding a sharp cheek. Green eyes clouded with unshed tears, her hand trembling slightly as she fights to contain the emotions that the simple idea of losing Lily causes on her. “Don’t you know that if you are gone, I’ll be nothing? That there won’t be any reason for me to remain in this realm if there’s no good left for me to experience at your side?”</p><p>“Zelda…” Lilith tries, but the redhead’s forehead is resting on hers and there are so many feelings overflowing her. She can’t find the words to tell Zelda that she’s stronger than she thinks herself to be. That, even if Lilith is gone, she will strive because just that who the High Priestess is. But words get lost in the abyss of shared breaths and the soft touch of frozen fingers on her own moist cheeks.</p><p>“You are crazy, Lily. Whatever you do, you need to come back to me. I’ll keep my promise. I will protect your child, and I’ll keep doing until we can solve this situation in our hands. I’ll keep her safe until it’s safe to bring her back,” the High Priestess lets out in a whisper.</p><p>“Her? Zelda… what?” Lilith asks, taking a step back and searching green eyes, frowning in confusion at this revelation.</p><p>“It was a girl, Lily. Your babe… It was, she is a beautiful girl,” the Directrix says, caressing her cheek again. But Lilith takes another step away, a deep frown on her features. Her eyes widen and terror strikes her face as she wonders whose child had she killed if not her own?</p><p>“I don’t understand… I…” She paces, and Zelda links her hands and walks them to the room Lilith was using -Zelda’s academy room-. One where people won’t be entering without knocking. “Please, take a seat,” she instructs the brunette as she rests heavily against the wooden door.</p><p>“I don’t want a seat, I want explanations… I want to know who I…” The former demoness stops herself from saying another word. “How? The magical signature was the same… I couldn’t tell the difference.” Zelda lays her head against the door and sighs, raising a hand to her forehead.</p><p>“You told us that the Dark Lord allowed you to live because you were expecting his son. When we saw it was a girl… Somehow Hilda understood what I didn’t say. She wrapped the babe tightly and presented her to you. Then…”</p><p>“You took her…” Lilith remembers vividly since the sight of Zelda and their baby warmed her heart. “What did you do?”</p><p>“I took her somewhere safe and exchanged her for a mortal boy. I feared the Dark Lord would kill her if you presented him with another girl and perhaps take him away of you if we made her a boy through a glamour,” the high Priestess explains, closing her eyes she wills her cigarette box and holder and turns one on as they appear in her hands.</p><p>“But… the boy… his magic…” Lilith tries because this truly doesn’t make an ounce of sense for the former demoness. “Yes, he has magic,” Zelda states, taking another drag before she continues, “Do you know Rosalind Walker? Sabrina’s friend?” The redhead asks, seemingly out of the blue.</p><p>“What does she have to do with anything?” Lilith frowns. Obviously, she knows all of Sabrina’s chums from her days as their teacher. “She’s a witch,” Zelda states after puffing a cloud of smoke.</p><p>“Well, mortal or not, that was quite obvious since she is a seer,” the mother of demons’ rolls her eyes at this, and waves her hand to encourage the smoking woman to go on.</p><p>“She’s not,” the redhead says firmly. “I made her family witches by sharing my magic with them. It is not Rosalind, the one who is a seer. I was one before I cursed the Walkers. So, taking a page of that same book, so to speak, I did the same with the orphan I stole. I gave him some of my magic and changed its signature, in the same way, I did with the Walkers’ signature,” She adds with feigned nonchalance, stubbing her cigarette out. Truly, it terrifies her to know what she might find in Lilith’s eyes.</p><p>“An energetic glamor?” The former demoness laughs cheerily. In her eyes, the redhead finds love and awe. “That’s… Zelda, did you always knew how powerful you truly are?” Lilith wonders.</p><p>“Yes…. And no… it’s growing, it seems. While everyone else’s magic was waning, I kept mine. But after I came back from the nether realm… It’s different. I feel it differently as if I can’t contain it even if I try. I hoped the same trick would work for the babe in the same way it worked for Rosalind Walker… Lucifer never mentioned he knew her magic was mine…. I did it to protect your baby. I thought once he took the boy away, we wouldn’t need to worry about him anymore... But then... the boy... Rosalind said...” she rambles.</p><p>“And I… Did I kill an innocent boy? A mortal baby?” Lilith asks eyes widened in horror. “I’ve taken countless lives but never once an innocent child.”</p><p>“Kill him? Darling, what are you talking about?” Zelda wonders with a frown. For all she knew, Lilith figured out about the baby doll the moment they handed it to her, and yes, the redhead had been avoiding her in case she couldn’t quite place who the kid’s magic came from... “I… I cooked him for Lucifer… as he did with Mary’s Adam.”</p><p>“No, you did not,” Zelda snorts. “You gave him to Hilda to hide him. I took him somewhere safe. There was an enchanted doll that Hilda brought back to you… You didn’t know this?” She asks surprised by the turn of events, searching around for the doll. “I thought you could tell…” she frowns. “You mean all this time…”</p><p>“It can’t be… I hear him…. I hear a baby crying… He is tormenting me for having killed him,” Lilith stutters out, ashamed of her actions.</p><p>“Oh, my sweet Lily,” the redhead lets out, bringing the brunette close. “The Revenant is the current terror we are facing, darling. I will make a wild guess, and based on what we’ve experienced with our Returned, I’ll say it’s the children you lost, the ones tormenting you. As far as the scriptures go, I know there must be hundreds of souls that could come to you and haunt you. Torturing you as Edward is torturing me with his presence.”</p><p>“I have to kill him, Zelda… I must or we won’t ever be free… Your daughter…” she says, and Zelda scoffs at it. “The baby girl you helped me birth won’t know peace until he is dead. I need to… I need to test if this spear will work.”</p><p>“Lily… Talk to me…” Zelda pleads.</p><p>“Lazarus… Love, didn’t you say Marie was playing with Lazarus? I’ll try it on him if he dies… Then there’s hope.” She smiles, but before Zelda can add anything else to stop her, to make her see reason. Lilith grabs a porcelain doll and disappears into thin air, not even noticing her magic hadn’t left her at all. </p>
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<a name="section0052"><h2>52. Chapter 52</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm sorry this is taking me so long... my timeline is a mess and I have to figure out how to fit what I have with what happens and like it...<br/>Truly that last part is the hardest one xD</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The first thing Lilith notices is the almost slumped way the voodoo witch seats as if she’s not happy with the results and dreading what comes next. Truly, the former demoness couldn’t care the less for the dark-skinned woman that tried to woo Zelda’s attention, but she worries about what the Vodouisant’s stance could mean for her sanity and that of the people Lilith had come to care about.</p><p>The brunette is utterly confused by her discussion with the High Priestess. She knows Zelda won’t outright lie to her, not about a child that the first witch remembers having slaughtered. That’s the issue, Lilith remembers killing and cooking the boy, and what kind of mother could that make of her in her love’s eyes? Is the thought of Zelda taking their daughter and not allowing her to help her raise her or getting close to their child that makes her eyes water, while she cradles the porcelain toy tightly against her chest.</p><p>“Excuse me,” Lilith says, hoping Lazarus won’t recognize her at once. They had crossed paths before when the Nazarene was still alive. “You are in the middle of a game.” She fights the tears and prays her voice won’t break when she explains to him what she came to ask. Yes, Zelda might have not lied to her about their child, but she’s so used to Lucifer’s lies that doubting became second nature. The first witch still remembers what she’s done, the pouring blood, the way her knife cut through chubby limbs. “My baby… died... you see,” she says, and Marie’s confused eyes fall upon her. “Can you bring him back, please?” the former demoness asks, ignoring the other witch.</p><p>“If there’s not a semblance of a body, then I’m afraid I cannot help you,” Lazarus answers her. The ex-demoness feels as if he lifted a weight out of her shoulders since she has kept what she thought was the last remains of her baby contained inside the porcelain doll she’s holding. “How unfortunate,” she adds.</p><p>Lilith walks away to break the doll and check for herself that’s only porcelain and plastic inside it… Yet, whatever spell Zelda has cast upon the toy, is so strong she cannot see through it. All the mother of demons sees is flesh and muscles. Blind rage takes over her as a baby laughs at her.</p><p>“If he cannot get him back, then he can take them all back to where they belong,” she mumbles grasping the spear. “Then I’ll get Lucifer, and finally I’ll free myself…” she adds. ‘She will be free of me, Lucifer, and the tormentor in her office. No matter how she believes, she won’t survive without me…. No, she has much to live for… Our girl needs a mother,’ she convinces herself as she rushes to kill the Resurrected Man and stop his games.</p><p>“How… How is this possible? Lazarus is immortal,” Marie asks, standing and turning her gaze towards a pacing Lilith that now seems more collected than before.</p><p>“The Spear of Longinus helped kill the Nazarene, who resurrected Lazarus. If it could kill the Nazarene, it could kill one of his last remaining miracles.” She says and realizes the baby’s cries are still there, yet they are not harrowing her anymore. “Thank you, Lilith,” Marie whispers.</p><p>“I didn’t do it for you,” she states, and Marie knows exactly who she did it for. The voodoo witch knows is Zelda Spellman who Lilith killed him for. “Nevertheless, today, life and death will triumph over the Returned, and you… you will receive not the boon you sought,” she says touching the former demoness’s hair softly. “but a boon,” she adds, kissing her forehead.</p><p>After killing Lazarus, Lilith walks away from Dorian’s room and to the Academy. She knows Marie is following her, but she can’t care less about it. The brunette doesn’t even dare to ask what’s this boon the voodoo witch will give her. They enter the building almost at the same time and the ex-demoness flees to her room not quite noticing how the younger witch seems to be at a loss of what to do with herself, and truly, if she did notice, there wouldn’t be a thing she would do about it.</p><p>The first woman gets to her room and drops herself in the bed, trying to make sense of the things she knows. Her baby girl was safe. The boy she thought she had cooked was alive somewhere, and the one she killed was nothing but a toy.</p><p>The balance is still broken, and she still feels it. It is still her responsibility to bring it to equilibrium by searching the Heir of the Earth. The first witch knows without a shade of a doubt that it’s Zelda. The brunette remembers the moment where she had figured this out, before Lucifer/Blackwood go to her, how she remembered saving someone. Truth is that by being so damn old, the first woman forgets more than she remembers, yet everything is inside. She does what she learned to do best and meditates.</p><p>“The rib,” she mumbles, bringing herself to the here and now while remembering vividly the night when she saved the burning witch. After killing the warlocks that trapped the witch, the former demoness had also grabbed the bone they used to keep the witch restrained. “Oh, heavens,” Lilith rolls her eyes because of course, she left that rib in a secret spot of her chambers... in Hell.</p><p>Now, Lilith just needs to figure out how to get herself to Hell and perhaps kill Lucifer as she’s in there.</p><p>At the academy, Zelda felt exactly the moment both Marie and Lilith returned. She wanted to search for Lilith to know she’s coping with it everything on her plate. Instead, she does what she always did, placing everyone else in front of herself. She searches for Marie.</p><p>“So, you beat the Resurrected Man, then?” the redhead asks when she spots the vodouisant who turns towards her. “Lilith was crucial to our victory,” Marie lets out in a whisper and can’t help but feel a pang of sadness when she notices the smile on the High Priestess’s face. “She’s been a busy girl,” she says, coming closer. “And now?” The Directrix asks because she always knew this woman would not stay around for long.</p><p>“Now, I’m afraid that when I lead the dead back to the graves, I must go and stay with them.”</p><p>“Stay?” Zelda wonders in a whisper, confused by the words of this woman she cares about, yet came to her life too late to be more than a friend. The redhead knows she could keep a woman like the vodouisant closer, especially when it was so easy to trust in her. “But, Marie, that’s absurd. Why would you stay with them?”</p><p>“I am not as I appear,” she says, searching for the Directrix's hands to give them a reassuring touch for what’s about to come. “Mambo Michelle Marie LeFleur is not my true name,” she continues, and Zelda takes a step back. The voodoo witch can see the redhead’s walls growing up faster than she thought possible. She sees the hint of pain and betrayal marring the eyes of the woman she loves.</p><p>“Who or what are you then, exactly?” The High Priestess asks, holding her ground and squaring her shoulders. The stoic facade in place. “I am Baron Samedi, a powerful Haitian Loa. The almighty father of the Guede Loa, the spirits of death and rebirth.”</p><p>“All this time?” Zelda asks. The redhead doesn’t know if she’s angrier for being played again, or that he hadn’t had the guts to tell her who he was, or at her own stupidity for not having noticed this.</p><p>Of course, Marie would’ve been powerful! It made sense she would smoke and drink with her until they were both drunk. Naturally, she would be charming… She was just yet another married spirit trying to bed her and take advantage of her!</p><p>And what for? He now hoped that since things had come clear between them, she would rush to his arms and plead with him to stay? That she would actually be eager to cross over and find him there waiting for her? Or that would use the stupid box and call for a favor she knew she would have to pay? No, she was done with them all. No more favors, no more giving away her name or holding back her powers.</p><p>Zelda Phiona Spellman was done.</p><p>The redhead only hoped Ambrose could finally have time to unearth the secrets of the prophecy so that she could point to her love how to bring the equilibrium back. Expecting that with it, they could fight whatever terror remained on a leveled field that wasn’t robbing her of her breath, no matter how used she was to the unbalance now. She’ll find the man that Lilith needs, even if it breaks her to pieces. If only to see her Lily happy and be able to take a deep breath as she hasn’t for so long now.</p><p>To her utter surprise, Hilda is at the Mortuary kitchen when she arrives, and is Ambrose who shouts at them to get outside. Once out on the porch, the Spellmans see Marie standing in the middle of the graveyard. They can hear her chants some words that are unintelligible for them at the distance they are.</p><p>Zelda feels the betrayal and feels the loss too. Because in the few weeks that she joined them, they became close friends. One she hadn’t had in such a long time; one she’d shared her burdens and eased her conscience with…. So, she can’t help it as her eyes fill with tears and she waves. It’s just as painful as before when Marie gets rid of her glamor, showing them what she hadn’t before.</p><p>Baron Samedi might be many things, but he had never hidden his feelings for the redhead. No matter how many other things he kept under the veil. He knows he had no chance; he knows he has screwed it beyond words with Zelda. So, he can’t help but send one last gift to the woman he fell for. As he takes away the souls that woke up with the terror he came to Greendale to fight, he leaves behind one that he knows will help the eldest Spellman heal while she still hides her truth from everyone else, and some truths, even from herself.</p><p>Completely unaware of Marie’s betrayal, Lilith hides in her room and wonders about the boon the voodoo witch mentioned, but she doesn’t dare to search for her and ask. She paces her room for what seems like hours until her eyes fall onto the spear, that remains all but forgotten in the middle of her bed.</p><p>The former demoness contemplates for a second, throwing the dagger to avoid its temptation. She cannot get herself to hell and in her possession, it’s quite inviting. Until she hears it. “Mama,” a child’s voice says, and she notices then the fetish doll Adam Masters had gifted her. “Adam?” the brunette tries, and the chain at its hips falls. When that happens, she understands that’s the boon.</p><p>Lilith is so very wrong.</p><p>Picking up the doll, the first witch cradles it as she had been doing with the porcelain one before, and she feels weak. She barely reaches her bed and falls unceremoniously on top of it when it happens.</p><p>The mother of demons stands in the middle of a crossroad, three ways extend in front of her and torches light one path. On her left, a cloaked figure creating a basket appears, then it places a bundle inside it. Lily hears the cries of a babe that enthrall her and makes her heart beat wildly in her chest. The mysterious figure then picks up the basket and walks toward the one lightened way. The brunette follows its every step as if in a trance.</p><p>Darkness becomes a moist forest, in one of the darkest nights the ex-demoness has seen. Trees seem to open up as the figure moves, and every single creature seems to stop and bow down as they encounter it. When the figure reaches a clearing, the brunette hides behind the tree line.</p><p>A wooden cabin appears in the middle of it as the cloaked figure lowers the bassinet to the ground. The cottage, Lilith notices, was guarded against mortal and enemies until then. A female-like hand crept out of the cloak and it looks to her as if it caresses a chubby cheek and fixes away a couple of dark strands over the pale skin of the babe. The figure stands up and knocks on the door, and it’s just then that the former demoness realizes she isn’t alone. </p><p>Besides her, a man she recognizes stands. “Baron Samedi,” Lilith greets, and there’s a smile on his face that feels utterly familiar now. She’s seen him before. They had crossed paths several times as she reached for souls that were still lost between realms. The ex-demoness has seen this smile before… not on him, but… “Marie?” She tries again. The smile on the man becomes even softer.</p><p>“I fell in love with her the moment she entered this realm. As a Loa of death and rebirth, I was among the first who saw the child as the mother created her, as your father should have created you. The child grew up, and the prophecies started to be fulfilled. I stood beside her, unable to affect her future when she was to be burned by the mortals. When warlocks thrust her in that fire, I stood beside her, with my hands tied. I could do nothing more than watch, hoping it would be me, the one who saved her, the one who would bring her back from the dead. I couldn’t do it, not even when the woman whose face you wear shot her, I wasn’t allowed… I wasn’t you.”</p><p>“What..”</p><p>“I knew it was you she created her for,” he continues, not giving her time to ask anything, “at the moment you, in that hideous form he forced upon you, saved her. I didn’t recognize you in this body, as you didn’t recognize me. And even knowing all I knew, I hoped that when I took Zelda’s hand she would fall in love with me, but she was already taken. All I got was a warning from her met-tet… Her mother… that I shouldn’t get in the way. When I took yours, I also got cautionary words from your met-tet… the father you believe has left you to your own devices, the one you believe has forsaken you.”</p><p>“Has he not? Don’t you know who I am and what I’ve done?” Lilith questions with tears in her eyes, His hand reaches her cheek, clearing the tears away.</p><p>“You are Lilitu, and he has always been there waiting for you to search for him. You are so loved, Lilitu… that you are Her love and She is yours.”</p><p>“I-I don’t understand…”</p><p>“You are the gem of his creation, Lilith. You both are perfect complements. What it should’ve been and wasn’t. You are his creation, she is hers… There wouldn’t be, there couldn’t be another way… I cannot give you the boon you asked since no child of yours has crossed over. However, this is the boon I can give you: I can allow you to remember this because these are my memories, not yours. Find her bone and prove her she’s the one you both are blindly seeking. Find your book, the one book of your creation, and you will further understand how you already knew all of this.”</p><p>“My book? The book of the Beast, you mean. How could I get to it? It’s impossible, I’m banished from Hell and I hid there both things.” She frowns, yet the Loa laughs. “How could he banish you from the kingdom you created, ma chere? I don’t know how you’ll manage, but you must. Now, you must wake up.”  As she opens her eyes, she notices morning already came. The fetish doll is not there anymore. And the boon she sought… wasn’t what she expected, not at all.</p><p>Another day goes by, with the redhead avoiding everyone, not wanting to answer questions she can’t really retort. She avoids Lilith because she simply knows the brunette will read through her demeanor in no time, and she doesn’t check with Gryla, not wanting to develop her bond with the child even further.</p><p>To Lilith's dismay, her love doesn’t come to find her, nor she brings the child she said she had protected. All Lilith knows are the rumors she can hear as she wanders inside the academy. About how Marie wasn’t a vodouisant at all. She also learns that ‘The Cosmic’ is still out there, and despite the efforts (aka sending Sabrina Morningstar to her demise) there are still three realms approaching. Yet, at least Hell, Heaven, and Earth had stopped their collision course into each other, for the time being.</p><p>The former demoness has no clue how they could even try to defeat another realm approaching them, but what she knows is that they can’t keep going like this, with the balance broken. Despite not being the demon Lucifer made of her, she still feels the unbalanced energies. And some of her powers, although they did not seem to be quite as they were.</p><p>“Why?” She wonders out loud, “why do I still have magic when he cast me away?” It surprises the first witch when Bezaliel appears inside her room. “I thought He forbid you from meddling,” Lilith says with a smile because she truly likes him.</p><p>“If I’m here on a mission, then I’m not meddling, Lilitu,” Bezaliel says, sitting in the bed beside her. “Then, what is that mission of yours?”</p><p>“You, Lilith… You were always my mission, my friend. I’ve been always by your side. You are quite the stubborn charge too.” He smiles brightly. “I’ve always watched you, tried to comfort you even when it was an impossible task. When I couldn’t meddle and couldn’t tell you where your love was,” the angel adds caressing her cheek. “Now, I’m free to answer the question you just made.”</p><p>“You know why do I still have magic when Lucifer cast me away?” The first witch repeats and Bezaliel nods. “You were never beneath him, Lilith. You just forgot, or maybe you never understood where you truly stand. He didn’t make you a demon, you made him a King. You have the power to change this, you have the one true way to free you both and fulfill what you are still stubbornly denying.”</p><p>“I’m stubbornly denying?” She asks confused.</p><p>“Claim what’s yours, Lilith. Search that piece of bone that will help her see your truth.” He finishes standing up, patting her knee as he does.</p><p>“Well, give me a way to enter Hell, and I’ll do what he wants me to do!” She shouts, raising her hands exasperatedly after hearing almost the same thing from this being. Bezaliel laughs.</p><p>“You are funny, Lilitu. You might need help not to get caught with the weapon you need to bring with you. But, why wouldn’t you be able to wander the realm of your creation, mother of demons?” He frowns, then smiles. “Some things are all in your head, Lilith…” the angel adds. “Things will fall in place.”</p><p>Lilith wants to swear, but she only rubs her face tiredly as Bezaliel disappears. She eyes the spear and growls at it. Truly, she knows what she must do. The mother of demons just has no clue as to how to achieve it. Frustrated beyond means, she paces.</p><p>“I need… I need… I need Zelda!” The first witch shouts, not containing herself, willing nothing more than the redhead’s presence in her room so she could hold her.</p><p>It surprises the brunette when she feels her powers reaching for the High Priestess wherever she is and pulling her to the Academy. Truth is, Lilith is surprised it worked and no matter how she knows the Directrix might chew her head from doing this unexpectedly, the former demoness truly doesn’t care from what situation she might have pulled the High Priestess from, she just needs her.</p><p>She’s been Zelda deprived for what seems like an eternity. There’s no baby to care and there are a shit ton of things to solve that don’t help her sleepless brain. (That boon was no sleep, for sure) No, she needs her. Lilith needs to cuddle up with the woman she loves and breathe her in.</p><p>“Lily,” Zelda whispers as she materializes in her former room at the Academy, seeing where she’s been pulled and who was responsible. The redhead doesn’t care she will have to make up some sort of explanation as to why she disappeared from the parlor, leaving her family behind. All of them, including Dr. Cee. Not when the crumpled form in the bed cries out for attention, even when unmoving. “Lily, what’s wrong?” the Directrix whispers, coming closer to her and sitting on the bed.</p><p>“I’m sorry I pulled you from wherever I pulled you from…” Lilith says sitting on the bed. “Love, I just… I can’t take it anymore…” she huffs. “It’s too much... So much... I can’t...”</p><p>“What’s wrong? Lily, talk to me?” The redhead says as she accommodates both of them better on the bed, holding her and being held by her. Lily’s lower lip quivers, her nose reddens, and her icy blue eyes darken with unshed tears. She’s truly at the edge of a panic attack.</p><p>“I miss you, darling. I miss our child, even if I only got to hold her for a few seconds. Zelda, I feel bereft,” she confesses. “I… there are things I must do, but I can’t find a way to do them, and I know that if I don’t... Then whatever effort, whatever sacrifice you, your family, your coven, and even I, have made until this point… will all be worthless.”</p><p>“I don’t understand, Lily… What do you need?”</p><p>“I need to get myself to my chambers in Hell. I need to steal the book of the beast…”</p><p>“No.” Zelda cuts her off before she can add anything else. “There’s no way you are stepping a foot into that realm, Lily. No. He will kill you on the spot.”</p><p>“I need to get there, love. No one else will find the thing I need. It’s sealed with blood magic.” The brunette smiles softly, caressing the redhead’s cheek and feeling oddly loved by the way Zelda worries about her. Green eyes search hers, trying to figure out where is the lie, where’s the trick, but she finds nothing there. “What aren’t you telling me, Lily?”</p><p>“I’ve told you a lot of things, darling. In some of them, you don’t believe in. I have the means to prove at least one thing. Let us not dwell on it, he banished me from Hell so I cannot enter the only place I knew as home before I met you.”</p><p>“Oh, Lily…” Zelda says kissing her lovingly. “Please don’t go there alone, love. If you find a way in… I’ll go with you.”</p><p>“No.” It’s the brunette’s time to deny her firmly. “You can’t, love. If we both go, then our child will be motherless.” The High Priestess opens her mouth to disagree but Lilith places a slender finger against her lips. “Even if you don’t believe her to be yours, my sweet Zelda, wouldn’t you raise her at my side?” Unable to say a word, the redhead nods. “Then, in the unlikely event that I fall… I want you to raise her, not as my daughter but as your own. Time will prove me right.”</p><p>“Lilith, love, you can’t go there alone.” It’s all Zelda says, when she feels herself being pulled. She places a kiss on the former demoness's forehead and smiles. “Give me until Sabrina’s birthday to find a way. If by then I can’t… you can find yours and I won’t stop you.”</p><p>The brunette launches herself forward and kisses swollen lips. “You got yourself a sealed deal, High Priestess,” she whispers against Zelda's mouth before the redhead vanishes from her room.</p>
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<a name="section0053"><h2>53. Chapter 53</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Where did you go just then?” Hilda asks, a deep frown on her brow as Zelda reappears inside the parlor. The redhead embraces herself by the middle, answering with a stern look of her own. Yet, something must have happened, since before Lilith pulled her back to the Academy, both Cerberus and Ambrose were there. Sabrina and Nick had just arrived, calling it a night because they were too tired and needed to catch some sleep.</p><p>They had all exchanged a knowing look since they all knew sleep was the only thing those two wouldn’t be doing. The High Priestess had had then turned to her alcohol cabinet and had offered her brother-in-law a glass before she had disappeared. Now, there’s only Hilda, squinting after as if Zelda was a child that needed to be poked and prodded for some answer.</p><p>“Where I was, and what I chose to do with my nights is of no consequence,” the High Priestess states scowling. “Why you summoned me, Hilda? Everyone else living in this house can perfectly survive by themselves without me watching over them,” she answers sternly. As if she had more important things to be doing than babysitting her niece, boyfriend, and nephew. If she was honest, holding Lilith was of further importance to her.</p><p>“Sabrina Morningstar is dead,” her sister states then, in almost the same mournful tone their Sabrina had used when she came down and asked Ambrose to prepare the embalming room for her to use. “What? How?” Zelda asks, pressing her hand tightly against a pained chest. She might have not been their Sabrina, but it was Sabrina. The same child they raised and loved, but from a different place in time.</p><p>“All we know is she crashed through Sabrina’s mirror. We assume the protective spell Ambrose and Nick cast on it to seal it from the Cosmic was what finally killed her. Ambrose was doing some last observations; Sabrina didn’t allow him to do a proper autopsy. He’s using Sweeney’s paper to check upon it. Zelds… I…” the blonde chokes on tears that she has been holding for too long.</p><p>“Oh, Hildy,” the redhead says and hugs her sister in a snug embrace, allowing her to cry her heart out, as her own eyes redden with droplets she won’t allow falling. Shiny tears simmer in green eyes as she tries to collect herself, by telling herself that this wasn’t their Sabrina. That their child isn’t gone. She needs Lilith, but all she gets is a dreadful and long wait. They can’t do much until they know more… and the ones that have more understanding of the current situation are both in the basement, working on Sabrina Morningstar’s body.</p><p>“And your husband?” Zelda asks against Hilda’s hair. Her voice is hoarse from the emotions she’s keeping at bay. The blonde sister sighs and breaks their embrace. With her eyes cast down to the floor, she takes a few steps and collapses in the closest seat she can find. “I sent him home, I know we most likely need all hands on deck, and I know, no matter how much he tries, he might become more an annoyance than a help at this point.”</p><p>“Hmm,” the redhead says, finding some scotch to drown her grief on. They hear someone rushing upstairs, “Ambrose, is that you?” Hilda calls.</p><p>“Yes, Auntie… I’m sorry I need to call Prudence, right away.” He shouts and leaves the sisters alone to wait and dwell.</p><p>And of course, everything would be more complex than they thought possible, ‘Blessed Blackwood, and his own uncontrollable ego. I should’ve killed him instead of marrying him.’ Zelda thinks as Hilda tries to console their niece. “The question is, what do we do now?” The redhead questions.</p><p>The academy seems the place to go since the observatory might have some leads. So, they transport themselves there. “Sabrina?” Zelda asks the young warlock that’s the last to appear. “She wanted some more time with Sabrina. She will join us when she’s done,” Nick says.</p><p>There’s nothing the High Priestess can say against it. Her niece has lost so many people in her brief life that it makes sense she wants to say goodbye to her other-self. Grieving her in private. Zelda understands, she always hated to break in front of people and preferred to mourn and lick her own wounds alone. Until Lilith, that is.</p><p>Yet, something changes as they stand in the observatory. She feels as if energy has left the realm. The rogue energy that Sabrina carried to be more exact, the one that unleashed the chaos in the equilibrium. Balance now feels even worse, and she tries to keep herself steady. Until Salem confirms her suspicions.</p><p>Everything happens so quickly after that. One moment they are all standing at the Observatory, trying to understand this fresh development, and she feels pained and breathless fighting the unbalance. Then the next they are in Sabrina’s room and attempting to pull her out of the last terror. Yet, the void is all-consuming, and not even releasing all her magic, Zelda can help them bring their Sabrina from where she is. Unless…</p><p>“Her soul,” she says, and Hilda agrees at the same time. The soul is not physical, and thus it was far easier to bring back. It was just their luck they had another body to pull it into. Then Sabrina is awake in her counterpart’s body. Blabbering about the void, Pandora’s box, and how she must get back in there.</p><p>She can’t. Zelda can’t allow her niece to get there in the same way she can’t possibly allow Lilith to get herself to hell when Lucifer is there, and he still hasn’t found out about… She shakes her head.</p><p>Prudence calls them back to the Observatory, and the High Priestess looks at the room, trying to understand what’s impossible for her to fully grasp. For now, she will let it go… if only because there’s somewhere else she needs to be, and there’s some other plan she needs to weave.</p><p>The Directrix leaves the room without a word, and since everyone else seems at least as confused as she was, no one follows. She doesn’t even care to check if someone sees her enter Lilith’s room at that time of the night. (Well, morning really)</p><p>Her Lily lies in the middle of the King-sized bed, her lithe frame taking almost no space in it, and Zelda stops herself from waking her. After all, the former demoness had been living quite the emotional turmoil herself and needed the rest as much as the redhead did.</p><p>“What happened?” Lilith asks in a whisper. It was the vivaciousness of Zelda’s magic mingling with hers that woke her up. She moves on the bed searching for the bedside lamp and turns the light on. “Darling, you look awful! Come, sit,” the brunette says patting the bed, but the redhead doesn’t move from where she had stopped.</p><p>“I know what you can do to get into hell,” Zelda states then, out of the blue. She feels irate at the events, as to how she almost lost her niece, how she did lose the one who referred to herself as Morningstar. How she felt her niece doing something stupid and there was nothing she had been able to do to avoid it.</p><p>“You know, you can be very scary when you look like this,” Lilith states looking at a very annoyed Zelda. “Hot damn, it’s sexy on you, love,” she grins mischievously and that does it. The redhead shakes her head and sighs.</p><p>“You are incorrigible, Lily,” the High Priestess smiles. “Didn’t you feel the change in the stupid balance?” She whispers tiredly, and the first witch throws the quilt away from her and moves to stand. “Of course I did, I just didn’t know what it could be. I thought perhaps Sabrina Morningstar had returned, or our Sabrina went searching for her.”</p><p>“It would’ve never been that easy, Lily!” the Directrix huffs. “Sabrina, my… our Sabrina… entered the Void dragging Pandora’s box with the stupid idea of opening it inside it and sacrifice herself to the void. So, we could all survive! I tried to pull her out of it with some help and we couldn’t. It was useless. <em>I</em> was useless, Lily!" She cries out. "There was only one thing to try to… I know how you can get access to hell and we’ll buy you some time to be there to search for whatever you need to search for…”</p><p>“Stop pacing, dear. You are making me dizzy,” Lilith says, stopping her and embracing her tightly. “Whatever happened, I’m here, I’m listening. But you must make some sense, Zelda, because I have no clue about how half of the things you just said connect to each other. Can you do that?” She wonders, moving away slightly and placing a strand of hair behind her love’s ear.</p><p>Zelda untangles herself from the very distracting arms of the demoness and takes a step back. “You are going to sell Sabrina’s whereabouts, and what my family and I did to be granted an enter,” she states.</p><p>“What?! Are you out of your freaking mind?! I won’t sell your family! No. Zelda... I can’t. I too have some morals, granted they have been quite twisted but… no… I draw the line there.” It’s Lilith’s turn to freak out, and Zelda’s being the one hugging and caring.</p><p>“Yes. You will, love...” she whispers in her ear. “This day will be awful. Is already tainted with death and grief. We’ll use it to plan this better. Then, when Halloween arrives, we will celebrate Sabrina’s birthday as I’ve promised to myself if we survived. Lucifer will come to find us, and we will be ready to receive him. I will have a bunch of the coven there with me and with Hecate’s help, we will keep him out of the house. If he gets past us, then I’ll summon the Spear and I’ll kill him myself,” she declares.</p><p>“Why you think knowing about a party will bring him to you?” The former demoness frowns. The High Priestess gives her one of the saddest smiles Lilith has ever seen. Her almost translucent hand finds a sharp cheek, and her thumb leaves behind a soft caress before the hand moves further back to accommodate a lock of hair behind her Lily’s ear. Every movement, the first witch knows it’s filled with grief.</p><p> “Because… Sabrina Morningstar is dead. Earlier today, she came through Sabrina’s mirror to bring a warning. Her body couldn’t sustain her as she crossed the realms and the wards that had been placed over the mirror. She sacrificed her last remaining energies to close the portal as the void consumed the realm she came from. With her last breath, she let out a warning about the void. Somehow, our Sabrina got a hold of Pandora’s box and thought it was a great idea to open it while being inside the void herself. We couldn’t pull her out… Sabrina was stuck inside the void, and we couldn’t pull her body…” Zelda sobs the last words.</p><p>“Let me guess, you pulled her soul into Morningstar’s body?” Zelda nodded, her lower lip quivering as she finally freed the tears that had been contained during the entire mess. “I couldn’t lose her, Lily. She’s my baby…” she let out, crying on the first witch’s shoulders.</p><p>“I know, love. I would’ve done the same thing in your shoes,” the mother of demons says, patting her back and caressing her hair while holding her close. Taking a couple of steps back until they could fall into a seat. For the first time in a while, it was Zelda the one crumpled all over Lilith, crying her heart out and blaming herself for the chaos that happened. “If only had I raised her better…” she whispered.</p><p>“There was nothing you could’ve done, Zelda. Everything that was supposed to happen, happened. We are just dumb pawns on a game that has long been thought.” Lily whispered.</p><p>“I only wish it didn’t hurt so bad…”</p><p>“Me too, love… me too.”</p><p>They remained like that for a while. Until they both got cramps and moved to the bed. Hours went by until the first rays of the dreadful morning shone inside the room. They had fallen silent, just getting the comfort from the presence of the other. Hoping that it would be enough to go on, yet unable to find any sleep.</p><p>“Are you sure you want me to betray your family?” Lilith asks as she feels the redhead stirring next to her, ready to transport herself to her home and start her day, most likely.</p><p>“It’s the only way, darling. If he’s attacking us in search of his daughter’s now occupied body, he won’t be in hell. I’m not sure that the news of her demise will be enough though. You must have an inkling about how he will react to such a thing.”</p><p>“It’s hard to tell with Lucifer. He never was attached to another being before. Now, Sabrina’s demise most definitively will piss off Caliban, and if I add some derisive wording, that will angry him too. He will want the body back, and surely, he’ll want war. Clay boy only wants a war to add this realm as a tenth circle.”</p><p>“Then that solves it. Tomorrow at six pm, I’ll walk you to Dorian’s and open the gates of Pandemonium for you to cross over with my magic. Since it will be my magical signature, they won’t be aware of your entrance until you are there. I know I can telepathically cross over the realms. I’ll be with you.”</p><p>“Zelda…” Lilith tries.</p><p>“Can you do this any other way, Lily?” the redhead asks, searching the former demoness’s eyes. “I’m sure you thought about it. So, tell me… did you find another way that won’t get you straight into your own demise? And don’t you dare to lie to me.” Zelda warns, biting her lower lip as she waits for the answer. The former demoness shakes her head.</p><p>“No. I thought about opening the Gates and just walking there.”</p><p>“Then… it’s settled. There’s one thing I do want to request before we embark on this crazy plan,” Zelda whispers and blushes with it.</p><p>“You are blushing, love?” Lilith smiles, surprised by this. “What’s this request of yours?”</p><p>“Can you… can we… make love, tonight?” She asks, feeling awfully shy. Lily launches herself forward and kisses her. “Every time you want, Zelda… whenever you need me…” The redhead smiles and bites her lower lip. “Then I’ll see you tonight?”</p><p>“I’ll wait for you at the cottage,” Lilith winks before another peck touches her lips and the High Priestess disappears.</p><p>The day is almost written to be awkward. It’s yet another of the hundreds of overcast days of Greendale, and it only adds a mournful weight to it all. Before Sabrina visited the void, they had agreed on having a burial for Sabrina Morningstar, laying her remains to rest at their graveyard. It would be even sadder to lower the girl’s corpse, in what would’ve been one day before they turned seventeen. However, it’s only worse. There is no body to bury and there’s this looming feeling that they should mourn for someone they both knew and didn’t at all.</p><p>“Please, sister, don’t tell me you are thinking about a stupid birthday party after what we all went through,” the High Priestess starts. “As things are, having a bunch of mortals here could only put them in harm’s way.”</p><p>“What could put who into harm’s way?” Ambrose asks, pecking Zelda’s cheek and moving to embrace his Auntie Hilda, before pouring some tea in a mug for himself, and stealing a pancake from Hilda’s pile.</p><p>“A birthday party,” Zelda grunts and groans her way into convincing her family to throw a party for Sabrina’s birthday the next night. It always works when she’s against it.</p><p>“But Aunt Zee, that could really help bring Sabrina out of her mood. Something to remind her that there’s still life after a loss. Won’t you agree, Aunt Hilda?” Ambrose adds, munching his breakfast.</p><p>“And not only to Sabrina, Zee… It would help all the younglings that have had such a hard year! We could make it into a celebration for having defeated the Void too.”</p><p>“What’s happening?” The white-headed girl asks as she’s followed into the kitchen by her beau. She quickly handles him a mug, a plate, and soon they are all sitting around the table. “A birthday party, ‘Brina,” the blonde sister adds excitedly, Zelda groans in the right moment and it’s done.</p><p>“Well, I told my mortal friends they could come over before…” she gulps, and all of them understand when it might have happened. “I suppose we could add some more people… and make it a bigger of a deal than I thought I wanted?” There’s some hesitation in the teen’s voice that makes Zelda lower her newspaper. She truly doesn’t want to add more weight to her niece’s shoulders, but it is the only thing she could come up with to stop Lilith from a suicidal mission of her own.</p><p>“Are you sure that’s what you’d want, Sabrina?” She wonders, looking at the teen with keen eyes. Her niece shrugs. “I don’t know, Auntie. But there’s life after a loss, isn’t there? Isn’t that what you tried to make me understand all this time?”</p><p>“I guess. Since this idea was yours, you see to organize it. I have things to do at the Academy, I shall go now. Sabrina, I’ll see you there after school. Ambrose, Nicholas… don’t be late. Hilda…” she says standing up, her lip curls upwards slightly. “Thank you, sister. For staying when needed.” The High Priestess lets out before she disappears, letting her family absolutely shocked by it.</p><p>True to her words, the Directrix keeps herself busy at the academy and tries not to raise too many suspicions when, late at lunchtime, she drops her tray harshly in front of Lilith. The former demoness raises an unsurprised eyebrow at this and smirks.</p><p>“Charming as usual, High Priestess.” She sneers, and Zelda huffs. Their external relationship always being more aggressive than the one they keep hidden behind closed doors. “I can take my tray anywhere else, Lilith. I would if you didn’t look like someone stole your goddamn bone.”</p><p>“I don’t need your company, Spellman. I just need what was taken from me,” Lilith grouses, looking to the little audience that tries to look as if they aren’t paying attention at the exchange. “If it means that we will get rid of you, I’ll get you there myself,” Zelda huffs.</p><p>“Is that so?” Lilith grins, her eyes glinting with amusement. She adds in Zelda’s thoughts. <em>‘I’ll see you tonight?’</em></p><p>“Can hardly wait,” the High Priestess adds.</p><p>“It’s about damn time,” the mother of demons agrees. The Directrix and former demoness then proceed to eat in silence, comforted by the presence of the other. When they finish and leave the room, they are quite certain there’s still no one who has a clue as to how different their relationship truly is.</p><p>That night, Zelda is restless at dinner time. But if someone notices, they don’t say a word, hoping not to get even further into the redhead’s known foul humor. When she goes for her usual nightcap, they follow in silence and then they talk about what they’ll do the next day for Sabrina’s birthday. As expected, she groans in disagreement, and they try to convince her that everything will be fine. That there would be witches from the coven too, in case something happened. “Besides, Auntie, we’ve defeated the void, right? It’s not there at the observatory, anymore,” the teen adds, almost sounding like herself.</p><p>Zelda sighs, “as if we didn’t fight several unexpected things since your last birthday, Sabrina. It’s not just this, I still wonder who that trinket man you mentioned it. Someone with access to pieces as dangerous as the Imp of the Perverse or Pandora’s box, can’t be all sugar and rainbows.”</p><p>“If someone of the like is to appear, Auntie. We can simply reinforce the wards.” Ambrose points out. “Nick and I could help you with them.”</p><p>“All right, all right… Is not like I could change anyone’s mind in the matter.” She sighs in mock frustration. “So, if all the same to you all, I’ll turn in for the night.”</p><p>There’s a couple of shocked expressions, but Hilda stops them, “don’t worry, I know my sister, I’m sure she’s just in need of some alone time to deal with everything that happened...” she says before they feel Zelda’s magic is gone from the house. “See... alone time. She’ll be back in the morning,” the blonde smiles reassuringly. But in truth, she worries too.</p>
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<a name="section0054"><h2>54. Chapter 54</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>We are so, so close!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Finally!” Lilith breaths. Her eyes twinkling with far more emotion than she dared to let out. Not when doubts still linger in Zelda’s mind and there is still some convincing to do. Still, it doesn’t stop her from bringing the redhead as close as their bodies will allow them.</p><p>“Home, sweet home,” Zelda whispers against soft, waiting lips she’s been dying to try since the last time they touched hers. Lilith takes her phrasing as an explanation not daring to even consider that Zelda is calling her home. No, that’d be too much and would mean too much for someone like her that was never someone’s safe port before.</p><p>“I’ve missed you, so much,” the former demoness whispers punctuating every word with a kiss or a bite down the column of Zelda’s neck. It seems like ages since they’ve last tasted each other when wasn’t that long. Still, if they truly had a say in their lives, here is where they would’ve spent most of their time. In each other’s arms, safe and loved… in the way they’d never felt before they found each other.</p><p>The High Priestess knows she left a confused family behind. She also knows Hilda would draw her own conclusions and most likely share them with them all. Keeping them calm and perhaps, if there was a doubt at all, keeping it to herself. Maybe Ambrose would’ve known who she was with, but he also would keep it to himself. The truth is… she doesn’t really care. Zelda can’t care. Not when as the sun settles down the next day, she will have to face Lucifer with her entire power on display while her Lily attempts to rescue her belongings from Hell.</p><p>If things go awry, this might be their last night.</p><p>However, if everything goes somewhere along with their plan… it can be the first one in many more to come.</p><p>“I can hear you think, love,” Lilith mumbles kissing and nipping the sensitive skin just below the redhead’s breast. A place she knows will bring goosebumps in her skin and will make her witch shudder. “Want to talk about it first?” She offers. The former demoness doesn’t quite know why she even offers when she was so damn close to where she truly wanted to be.</p><p>“It’s nothing, darling. I’m just stupidly worrying about tomorrow,” Zelda sighs. The brunette sits back for a second and looks at the woman laying with her. Her heart skips a beat when she notices exactly how lucky she is to have someone as beautiful as this witch all to herself.</p><p>“Until tomorrow, there’s nothing you can do about it, Sweet Zelda. Nothing that you haven’t already thought about or consider, of that I’m sure. There’s nothing I can do either to prepare for what I must do. But if we dwell too much on it, we might fail, if only because we scared ourselves of things we ought to do. I’m ready to do what it takes, love,” the brunette states caressing the redhead’s cheek and giving her a sad smile. “The only thing I might regret if things go as wrong as they could go will be not meeting our daughter. However, I understand that by bringing her here or by taking me to her, we will risk our child, and that’s a risk I’m not willing to take.”</p><p>“Lily…” She tries, but words won’t come out, and tears stubbornly well up in her eyes. The former demoness lower soft lips on top of hers, kissing her lovingly.</p><p>“You will take care of her, Zelda. I know you will. You are an excellent mother, love. I saw that the moment I met Sabrina, and no, you can try to excuse yourself and saying it’s Hilda’s doing… but that girl is too much like you for that.”</p><p>“I’m sorry I didn’t introduce you to... our daughter properly,” the redhead says with a quivering voice, not quite accepting the girl as her own flesh and blood but as the daughter, she’d raise along with her Lily. “If you are silly enough not to return to me, I will do as you ask and I will care for her as if she was my own.” Tears fill green eyes once again at the thought of losing her, and blue ones aren’t further behind. While the former demoness drops to kiss soft lips, they taste the salty trails that make it all so bittersweet. “I love you,” the redhead moans as lips descend to nip her earlobe, and as a response dark nails claw at her back, leaving marks that will disappear come morning. </p><p>“I love you,” Lilith whispers then, searching the orbs she adores, and finding there’s no fear, no rage, no nothing else but a pure, unaltered, gleam of love, directed straight at her while a creamy white hand touches her face tenderly. Before the brunette can react, a strong leg throws her over, and it’s Zelda, the one straddling her hips, lowering her face close to her own.</p><p>Whereas before they were cloudy with tears and then bright with love, green eyes are now calm and certain... As if the redhead was looking at her safe place, and Lilith finds herself fascinated by them. A curtain of red hair makes the position a bit more intimate if it could. Zelda rests her weight in one arm, while the other caresses softly the contours of Lilith’s face as if memorizing it. “It scares me how much I love you, Lily. It scares me how fearful I am of losing you… So, whatever you do… don’t fucking die... or I kill you.” The redhead warns, and the former demoness chuckles between tears. Showing Zelda the emotional mess she currently is.</p><p>“Your request is my command, High Priestess,” the mother of demons’ whispers, her voice wavering under the weight of so many feelings.</p><p>They both wonder how it would’ve been having this night while feeling each other under their skin as before Zelda’s death. But they don’t dwell on it, taking the moment as it comes. Kisses, licks, moans, pants, hands that search to burn into memory what might be the last time they touch. Emotions rolling freely, tears and loving words whispered give way to a vibrating climax that left them both panting for air and feeling whole.</p><p>For a perfect moment, they forget all about the unbalance as they breathe each other in deeply. Then they laugh because it seems so damn stupid for them to be placed into this position. When one will put the other one’s family in jeopardy, to attempt fixing what might not be fixable at all.</p><p>They make love until they can barely move, legs trembling without prompt, and simple touches making them climax out of the overload of pleasure they both experienced. As their alarms go off, announcing to them that the sun is about to come out in Greendale, they finally fight their tired bodies and stand.</p><p>“Breakfast?” Zelda wonders, and Lilith nods. “Please, I’m famished. You, Ms. Spellman, are a sex demon when you put yourself into it.”</p><p>“Coming from you, Lily. I’ll take that as a compliment,” the redhead grins as she summons a warm robe to cover herself, and Lilith does the same.</p><p>The next hour feels quite domestic. They magic ly summon ingredients and things to get breakfast ready, while covered in robes and barefooted. With their hair utterly mused, dark circles under their eyes that bear witness to the sleepless night. They share smiles and simple touches, pecks come freely, and they find themselves trapping the other to steal a kiss every once in a while as they move around the kitchen. Once again, they don’t dwell on how perfectly they fit or how wonderful would’ve been being this carefree forever. Because if they did… they couldn’t be sure they would sacrifice this bliss for the world.</p><p>Once they finish breakfast and there’s still an hour left before they must make their appearance, they take it to the bathroom where they lie in each other’s arms while sitting in the warm water of the tub until their fingertips wrinkle.</p><p>Finally, there’s no time to keep postponing things. “You know what, I might not be able to let you go if we don’t do it right now,” Zelda states.</p><p>“Then, by all means, let us get me there.” Lilith nods. They transport to Dorian’s instead of home or the Academy, and Zelda frowns. “I do not know where those damned paintings might be. You?”</p><p>“No, he kept those away from me. He feared I would burn them if I knew where they were. He was right.” Lilith shrugs. The redhead takes a deep breath.</p><p>“Ambrose. I’ll summon Ambrose,” the High Priestess says, and a half sleep warlock appears in front of them. “What? Where?”</p><p>“There’s no time, Ambrose. We need to send Lilith to Hell, and I know you were close to Dorian. He ought to have shown you where he kept the paintings to the Underworld,” Zelda states, not giving him time to question her.</p><p>Her nephew rubs his eyes tiredly, yawns and nods. He leads them around the building, and it’s just as the clacking of their heels resounds in the room that the redhead notices her nephew is in his pajamas and barefooted, most likely woken up by the summoning she did. She’ll apologize later if she must.</p><p>“Here they are,” he says, stopping in front of a series of paintings that Lilith recognizes easily as they portray what she before called her home. “Are you sure there’s no way to summon those objects?” Zelda whispers to Lilith as they stand side by side in front of the paintings, staring at the desolated imagery of Hell. “If there was, I would’ve had them already,” the former demoness whispers, then opens one hand and the Spear of Longinus appears in her hand. They don’t even realize the widened eyes of Ambrose as this happens.</p><p>“Will you be able to summon this, if you need it?” The brunette asks softly, and the eldest Spellman opens her hand and smiles. The spear disappears from Lilith’s hand and into Zelda’s. “All right. I just hope that wasn’t telekinesis. I’m ready.” The mother of demons says, squaring her shoulders.</p><p>“Facilis descensus Averno. Noctes atque dies patet atri ianua Ditis. Sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras, Hoc opus, hic labor est,” Zelda starts, raising her hands towards the paintings, with each word wind howls around them. “Ego Phiona, praecipio tibi iubes tibi aperire portas inferi et permittant mihi animam possint per te transire!” She finishes.</p><p>“I cannot feel you anymore, Lilith,” the warlock on their back states with a frown. Zelda nods, “that is how this is supposed to work, Ambrose.”</p><p>The first witch takes a deep breath, noticing the doors are open. Ambrose’s confirmation that she’s covered with Zelda’s magic means everything is ready for her to cross over.</p><p>Closing her eyes as the weight of what she must do finally falls over her shoulders, the first woman takes one step towards the portal, only to be stopped by an icy hand grasping her wrist. To her utmost surprise, the redhead pulls her close. Not caring about Ambrose in the background, Zelda kisses her Lily senseless, until they need to breathe.</p><p>“Whatever you do, Lily… remember your promise,” she says as they rest their foreheads together. “Come back to me, love.”</p><p>A darker hand finds the alabaster skin of Zelda’s cheek, her blue eyes find tormented greens. “You know, love, that might be the one promise I can’t keep. I’ll do anything in my hands to return to you, as you did before for me… But if I don’t…”</p><p>“No,” Zelda shakes her head and her hands find Lilith’s, keeping them tightly grasped.</p><p>“If I don’t, I know she’ll get the best mother of the two she had, love,” Lilith says loud enough so she would hear them even if she tried not to. “I love you,” she whispers in Zelda’s ear before placing one lingering kiss on her lips and rushing through the portal.</p><p>The eldest Spellman collapses to the ground as she fights her emotions. ‘<em>Can you hear me? Please, Lily, tell me you can hear me,</em>’ the Directrix thinks and hopes.</p><p>‘<em>Always, my love. Now, get up and get out of there. There’s enough stuff you should worry about instead of being preoccupied with someone who’s lived this long. Don’t you dare to mourn me, I’m not yet gone.’</em></p><p>“Auntie Zee?” Ambrose tries kneeling beside her. “I’m fine, Ambrose. There’s one thing I must ask, and I’m sure you already have an inkling of what it might be.”</p><p>“I won’t say a word, Auntie. But whoa… your magic… you think the energetic glamor you did will stand Hell?” He wonders. Zelda remembers then how Sabrina had taken Rosalind to Hell, and how Lilith herself hadn’t noticed it was her brand of magic. “Yes. It will hold. Let’s go home, I’m sure your Aunt Hilda will be up and wondering why is taking us so long to get down.”</p><p>“Are you really all right, Auntie?” Ambrose wonders as he helps her stand up. She gives him a bittersweet smile and caresses his cheek softly. “No, Ambrose. I’m not… But no one else can know that. Things must happen and I need to be ready to welcome them. Ready to return?” She asks, “I’m quite certain you could use some shoes.”</p><p>“Right… You guys summoned me from the bed, you should be glad I wore a nightgown.”</p><p>“Nothing I hadn’t seen before, nephew… nothing I hadn’t seen before…” She winks, and he’s left dumbfounded once more when he noticed they didn’t use any incantation, they just transported back to the mortuary, completely out of the blue.</p><p>When Ambrose joins his aunties downstairs, he finds there was no trace of what he saw that morning. Zelda Spellman is all happy and smiles as she offers to be the one to wake up Sabrina. “What’s wrong with her?” he asks his blonde Aunt who shrugs in response.</p><p>“Oh, I suppose that wherever she disappeared to yesterday, did help her to collect her bearings. Hopefully was that cute woman I saw her with once,” she adds in a conspiratorial whisper.</p><p>“Which cute woman?” Ambrose frowns in confusion for a second, wondering when on Earth his auntie had found time to be with anyone else. Not with all the running, they all had been doing as of late.</p><p>“You know, the one from a few weeks back, when she took a day off? She never did say who the woman was, or why there was only a magical signature when I found them… You know something.” Hilda states, squinting at him. “Ambrose Spellman, what is it you know?”</p><p>“I…” He tries raising his hands in surrender as Hilda points at him with the spatula she was handling. “You know why there was only a signature?” she wonders, and he sighs. “Tell me, you know I won’t say a word.”</p><p>“Ah… but you must promise you will keep the lovey-dovey eyes to yourself when I tell you,” Ambrose adds pinching the bridge of his nose, and the smile Hilda gives him makes him know it won’t happen. “I swear!”</p><p>“I’ve read in one of those mysterious tomes that belong to Aunt Zee, that if you enter the astral realm with your… hmm… soulmate… there will be only one remaining magical trace that won’t be of either but them both.” He winces, avoiding looking at his blonde Aunt for fear of what he might find.</p><p>“Oh… so she found it? I’m so glad she did, Ambrose. No wonder she is so chipper this morning. I can’t wait to meet…”</p><p>“Auntie…” Ambrose warns, and Hilda sighs. “Right. I’m just so happy.”</p><p>“Yeah, me too.” He says. Ambrose had learned about Lily from almost the very beginning. Even before his Aunt knew she was the Lilith.</p><p>However, there’s more in his knowledge that weighs heavily too. There’s that thing his Aunt Zee had mentioned, about how the former demoness prophecy speaks of a male, not of a female. He also is aware that sometimes soulmates aren’t made to be together for the duration of one lifetime, and if what he witnessed that morning was something to go by… No… maybe the prophecy was wrong, maybe there were translation issues in it…</p><p>“She’ll be joining us shortly,” Zelda announces then as she joins them, and looks from her sister to her nephew. “What?”</p><p>“No-nothing…. Just… Where did the pancakes go?” Hilda asks, frowning in confusion.</p><p>And as at the Spellman Mortuary, the family has breakfast and they make sure Sabrina wants to celebrate her birthday. In Hell, Lilith reaches Pandemonium and the castle. ‘<em>I’m here, love</em>,’ she says to Zelda and takes a deep breath. ‘<em>Are you sure you want me to do this?</em>’</p><p>‘<em>Do it. I’m ready for what it takes.</em>’ Zelda’s voice reaches her head, and she enters the palace using her knowledge of it to get to the Throne room undetected by the guards with the Longinus’s spear hidden in her clothes, and a plea bargain at ready. The former demoness only needs to figure out if the Book of the Beast remains in the place he had last created for it.</p><p>“You must swear on the Book of the Beast that when all is said and done, you will restore my powers,” she says before giving away the damning information that will condemn the Spellman’s.</p><p>“Lilith…” Lucifer shakes his head, tired of her games. Then she feels it, the energy of Lucifer searching for the book as he wonders if he will agree to this or not. “Fine.” He sighs, walking past her. Unknowingly confirming to her where the book is.</p><p>With that knowledge grasped in her mind. The first witch sells the Spellmans for a chance of wandering the palace alone. Caliban, of course, rages.</p><p><em>‘It’s done, love. Please tell me you will be ready for the night.’</em> Lilith pleads, hoping Zelda will hear her. While she listens to the boy complaining about it all, creating ripples of doubt in the King of Lies.</p><p>“The opportunity would be… perfect,” she adds, and if there’s one thing Lucifer always trusted of her, was her strategical mind. The first witch knows that, and that does it. He claims to need an army, but he won’t trust her to lead them (Not that she wants to either). Lilith allows Caliban to take his angry lead and find himself the army they need. When it’s just the two of them in the empty room, she takes a chance, “May I wait in my old chambers, your disgrace?” She requests.</p><p>“Do what you want, Lilith, I don’t care,” Lucifer waves.</p><p>Walking around avoiding being spotted, she finds one of her former minions on the way to her room. His eyes sparkle at the sight of her and she orders him to let her know when Lucifer is gone. She continues her path until she reaches the double doors of her chambers, and she’s glad to notice it remains untouched.</p><p>Taking a deep breath, she fights with memories of the millennia spent in this very same room. ‘<em>They are finding an army, I’m not sure which kind,</em>’ she informs Zelda as she spots the place she needs and touches it softly.</p><p><em>‘Get out of there as soon as you can, love. Get back to me,</em>’ Zelda pleads once more.</p><p>
  <em> ‘Once I do everything I came here to do, darling.’</em>
</p><p>
  <em>‘I don’t like this, Lilith… don’t make me plead again.’</em>
</p><p><em>‘Oh, but I do like when you plead, sweet Zelda. When you pray my name as a plea for me to go on, to love you as you deserve,’</em> Lilith continues and wishes she could see her. The first witch can imagine the soft blush that covers the High Priestess cheeks at that instant.</p><p>There’s no answer, as she moves around and finds the black velvety bag and takes it from its hiding place. She caresses the bone inside it softly. Hoping it will work out... if she manages to get out of Hell alive.</p><p>The former demoness doesn’t realize that hours have passed until a minion knocks at her door to inform her of Lucifer’s departure. Standing up, Lilith rushes to the room where the Book of the Beast lies hidden.</p><p>Save for a wooden table, a chair, and a fireplace, the room is empty. There’s no fancy décor, it’s just an empty box to keep the most precious thing of the realm safe. No one would have thought to look in this room for it. The book’s nowhere to be seen, but she can feel its hum.</p><p>“Show yourself!” she orders, and the book appears on top of the table.</p><p>Caressing the leather-bound tome that until the last Spellman signature kept growing on hundreds of pages every year, she opens it in the last signed pages. Hundreds of names follow Sabrina’s, but there are still many blank pages. Witches that never got to sign this hatred book. Witches that had never given their powers away.</p><p>The former demoness doesn’t quite know what she is looking for until she hears a ‘<em>whatever you are doing, hurry the heaven out of there</em>,’ coming from Zelda.</p><p>Lilith smiles at the brazen warning and flips the pages quickly. Truth is, they took at least a dozen of signatures on the same day and she does not know what she’s searching for. However, she remembers a date vividly, that Halloween where she breathed freely again, and equilibrium was reached.</p><p>Waving her hand on top of the book, the pages flip quickly at their own volition. Lilith is still unaware of her own magic that still lies inside her, blocked by her own mind and fears.</p><p>The book pages halt and there it is…</p><p>In a book that has seen thousands of signatures if not millions since the first one she had freely given away, there’s only one that shines firmly on Halloween, 1615 of the mortal year… and Lilith laughs, because how could’ve she been so blind?</p><p>Languages have always been a gift of hers and she now clearly sees the message she failed to see before. There, in a deep blood red, a curvy signature stands alone… there are only six red letters that mean more than anyone else realized until now. The thing with translations is that sometimes they get the gender all wrong, yet she knows she has the right one… it couldn’t be any other way.</p><p>“The Goddess Gift,” she reads out loud and chuckles, tears fall from her eyes as she shakes her head.</p><p><em>‘Get out of there, Lily!’</em> Zelda shouts in her head. The former demoness decides she won’t drag her to this mess if she can help it. There’s enough on the High Priestess plate with everything she had put them through when she blindly followed Lucifer’s orders before, and with Blackwood’s calling for the Eldritch terrors.</p><p>Against her better judgment, clouded by a need to protect her Zelda. Lilith decides to do what she must, and summoning hellfire, she burns the Book of the Beast. “No one else shall empower you,” she sneers as the book turns to ashes.</p><p>She walks back to the throne room to wait for him. To see if he really is what he always proclaimed he was. Now, it doesn’t surprise her he isn’t. Lucifer is nothing but a fallen angel. One that God himself had forsaken, one being she thought she could relate with because of their similar histories of hate and being despised by the same creator. The first woman finally realizes she is not him. God hadn’t kicked her, he hadn’t forsaken her, not if the angels that always appeared around her were something to go by. No, the first woman had walked out by her own choice. She had called her father’s name and got out of Eden… The Gem of Creation had broken the perpetual peace, and by doing that, Lilith created Hell.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Since Sabrina used Dante's words to open her entry to Hell. I figured Zelda would go for something older, and maybe in Latin... so, her words (or the beginning of them) come from Virgil's The Aeneid.<br/>So this: Facilis descensus Averno; Noctes atque dies patet atri ianua Ditis; Sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras, Hoc opus, hic labor est ... translates into this:<br/>“The gates of hell are open night and day;<br/>Smooth the descent, and easy is the way:<br/>But to return, and view the cheerful skies,<br/>In this, the task and mighty labor lies.”</p><p>Now, the next part: Ego Phiona, praecipio tibi iubes tibi aperire portas inferi et permittant mihi animam possint per te transire! ... I totally made up so if there's a Latin major here.. please forgive me :D  Supposedly means:  I, Phiona, am giving you the command to open the gates of hell. Permit me to be able to pass through thee, and my soul to me.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0055"><h2>55. Chapter 55</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Ready for one more?</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Zelda’s day was filled with many bizarre things. After a night of mostly carnal pleasure and lack of sleep, the High Priestess had allowed her love to sweep through her fingers across magical portals to the one place where the former demoness was utterly unsafe. Knowing that the brunette's mission was to sell her family’s whereabouts to the being that -once upon a time- Zelda had adored, feared, and devoted her every day. The same being the High Priestess now despised more than anything. (Well, except maybe Faustus).</p><p>It wasn’t only that. The day was filled with missing objects starting with Sabrina’s alarm clock, pancakes and who knew what else they now lost. The redhead wrote it down as one of her niece’s new silly acts. But, it wasn’t until later than night that the eldest Spellman realizes it was her own fault.</p><p>Falling back into her Directrix role, she tried to keep her focus on her work while at the academy, even though her thoughts kept running circles on the information she had. Lilith had made the High Priestess aware that Lucifer was searching for an army, although the former demoness didn’t know exactly of which kind.</p><p>To top it all, there was a strange tugging she kept feeling where the only missing part of her body was… well, missing. An odd feeling she once felt too close, as a cowardly warlock tied her rib with a thread to keep her magic bound. Yet, it wasn’t the same, it somehow felt as if someone was handling it with care, and it was awfully distracting. It had her on edge, wondering in whose hands this thing that could have such a power over her was, and what did it mean that it was now out there…</p><p>Had it got to Lucifer’s hand? She wonders. It seemed convenient that he would want to restrain her now that he knew where he could find them, and he knew more about the extents of her own magic thanks to their encounter with Metatron.</p><p>Rubbing her face tiredly, she drops her head in her hands and sighs, feeling stupid for having lost control of herself that day in front of him.</p><p>“Auntie Zee…” Ambrose calls, entering her office, and she slumps back in her chair. “Don’t you dare to ask that question…” She warns. Her nephew has to bite his tongue to stop himself from asking how she is faring. “What is it you need, Ambrose?”</p><p>“Ah, I was wondering what wards you’ll want to be set around the property?” he winces, and she sighs. “Everything you can come up with, Ambrose… although, I’m not sure it will resist,” she states. There’s a nagging feeling in the back of her head that tells her that until Lilith gets back at her, there’s nothing they can really do to stop the Dark Lord from overpowering them all.</p><p>“Auntie Zee… about your magic…” Ambrose trails off. Zelda raises her eyebrow, pointing at him that he should carry on with whatever he was going to say. “What if… the prophecy is wrong… or poorly written… or …”</p><p>“Ambrose,” she sighed and straightened in her chair. The only sign of her distress now was the cigarette and holder that appeared on her finger. “It doesn’t matter. If it was I the one who could fulfill it… Then there would’ve happened already. It didn’t…” Zelda states, taking a deep drag and releasing the smoke, grabbing the strength she needs to collect her bearings and maybe even let out more of her thoughts.</p><p>“You ought to understand that I am aware that I might be her soulmate and she might be mine. At least, if we take into consideration what Hilda mentioned when she found us traveling through the Astral plane. However, that doesn’t mean I’m the only one for her… She’s…. Lilith is eternal, Ambrose… The gem of the God’s creation and the only being who ever dared to call him by his true name. What makes you believe she wouldn’t be granted several soulmates as mortals claim to happen with transmigration?”</p><p>“I-I didn’t consider it,” he stammers out as she smokes.</p><p>“Right. I did. I do… It doesn’t make me love her less or not worrying about her any easier. The only truth I do know is that I’m not the hero she and you are searching for… I’m just a witch, Ambrose. I might be a powerful one at that, but nothing short of a witch.”</p><p>“I’m sorry, Auntie. I shouldn’t even bring it up. Not today at least.” He smiles sadly at her and releasing some smoke, she shakes her head.</p><p>“Don’t worry, I’m a grown woman. I can take some questioning, and you know this. Now, if you excuse me, nephew… I must get to class before they manage to mix another set of ingredients. Hecate knows we could live without another skunk bomb… and you should head back to the Mortuary and do what I requested, please.”</p><p>“Why? What do you know we don’t, Aunt Zee?” He asks as she stands up and starts to walk away. Zelda stops, considering letting him know exactly what she thinks might happen, but not willing to tempt fate more. She just shakes her head and leaves him there, wondering.</p><p>As promised, they keep Sabrina’s birthday party simple. Their family, her mortal friends, and the oldest students from the academy, as per her Aunt’s request. Doctor Cee is missing because it’s Halloween and his store is filled to the brim.</p><p>All around the house, things keep disappearing. The bowl of treats for the kids it’s unexplainably empty, but they don’t fret. There aren’t many children who dare to come up all the way to the already spooky Mortuary, less on Halloween. In any case, the redhead tries to be the one opening the door when they do and creates treats out of the blue, if only so she won’t have to see the disappointed faces of the brave kids.</p><p>Then it’s late, and Sabrina’s cake is also gone… and they don’t quite know what’s happening.</p><p>Without a warning beyond what she already knew, the Dark Lord, Caliban, and the last of the Kings of Hell appear at the outskirts of the Spellman property followed by a few ... miners?</p><p>Zelda feels a weird pull of her magic as the barriers created break one by one as if raised by her own hands or by those who added them even before she had placed her first one in that property centuries ago. It makes no sense to her.</p><p><em>‘Whatever you are doing, hurry the heaven out of there</em>,’ Zelda sends a message to Lilith, hoping her love would take the hint and just return.</p><p>Of course, Sabrina being Sabrina goes headfirst into facing her sperm donor. All the hard work to try to keep her protected threw out of the window as the teen steps out of the house and goes out to the lawn. Where the father of lies blabbers about what he’s going to do with Sabrina’s body.  </p><p>Zelda feels it keenly then, as the unbalance hiss around them. This the High Priestess considers can’t mean anything good.</p><p>“Sabrina, get inside. Now! All of us.” Zelda shouts ready to fight them all once she knows her family, the mortal, and those children she brought along are inside the safety of the building.</p><p>Lilith’s words at the cottage that morning rush back to her mind then, ‘that girl is too much like you,’ and Zelda feels the guilt dropping over her shoulders when her niece -her very brave and sometimes idiotic niece- decides to sacrifice herself to the Dark Lord so Sabrina Morningstar’s body could have the burial he thought his daughter deserved.</p><p>The Spellman matriarch doesn’t move from where she’s standing, almost at the end of the stairs, as Sabrina binds her powers, repeating Lucifer’s spell. The entrapped energy forcing the High Priestess to take another breath. Zelda feels a thin layer of sweat covering her skin, and she knows she looks worse for wear. This change must have reached Lilith, she knows it. However, she doesn’t really know what her love is doing in Hell.  </p><p>It happens then, as Ambrose prepares to help her fight, that Lucifer launch his attack and they too disappear. “How? That spell was foolproof.” Lucifer states.</p><p>‘<em>Get out of there, Lily!</em>’ Zelda sends one last warning to Lilith, knowing that the next thing their former God would do was regroup to prepare his next incursion. In a perfect imitation of the war that had caused his exile to begin with.</p><p>And the day only gets worse, as Lucifer disappears and all their worry falls back into Sabrina that looks utterly distressed. While dealing with it and the weight of keeping her worries about Lilith to herself, Zelda doesn’t even have time to process the fresh energy she feels added to her magic. Her powers feel… surprisingly... free… like before, when she was a child and her soul wasn’t yet bound to the book of the beast.</p><p>The High Priestess can’t dwell on anything else when her niece looks at her as if she could answer what she doesn’t quite understand herself. “I don’t know where they went or how to get them back.”</p><p>“What do you mean you don’t know?” Zelda frowns, and questions come out from everyone at once as they try to make heads and tails from this new mess. Ambrose looks at her and nods to the newly missing lamp. “Where is this new power coming from?” The redhead asks more to herself than to her niece, but the teen gets even more distressed and a vase disappears behind them.</p><p>Exchanging a glance with her nephew, she points him to take the lead. The Directrix knows that whatever she might need to ask her niece would only distress her further and there are too many people in there who are at risk of disappearing to only Hecate knew where.</p><p>Ambrose and Sabrina had always blindly trusted in each other. So, they disappear down to the mortuary, along with her other current source of comfort, Nick Scratch. Zelda watches the three of them go before she excuses herself to the porch.</p><p>One of her hands makes the way to her chest, and rubs it, feeling as it constricts without an explanation. She feels breathless. She also feels like she can breathe deeper than before. The High priestess also notices there’s more energy shaking the already disturbed balance. ‘Lilith, where are you?’ she wonders, contemplating if Sabrina’s newest skillset is what brought this new change. Worrying about her love and hoping that after dealing with this evening's events, they can find Lilith’s other half and restore the balance once and for all.</p><p>“Aunties!” She hears Ambrose call inside the house and taking one last breath she enters only to find out not only that her niece is gone, but that they were the guilty part of making her the void.</p><p>Hell is another chaos altogether. After burning the Book of the Beast, the book of her creation, Lilith felts freer than she had felt for the better part of her life. There was no more a pull of her energy and she could feel the traces of her magic returning to her as she sat on the throne of Hell. Zelda’s rib remains hidden between the bones of her dress.</p><p>When Lucifer appears, all mournful and worried, she frowns. She had tried to reach balance by freeing all the witches from empowering him, and by extension, that should’ve taken power from his daughter. Thus balancing the equation, but the former demoness quickly notices it didn’t work, and the news of Sabrina’s display of God-like powers is shocking, to say the least.</p><p>Be that as it may, here she is in front of the man who, for most of her existence, had had her on her knees and begging. All the time keeping her out of the loop from the origin of the Kingdom, he claimed for himself. The one he had used to keep her on a short leash and working hard to one day be able to reign beside him. And once more, Lucifer betrays her.</p><p>Rage fills her body as he shouts how he thinks her needs, and his promise to her is nothing but pathetic. Not quite surprisingly, Longinus spear warms up in her hand as the mention of his need to destroy Sabrina.</p><p>Yes, that child had been nothing but troubles since the beginning; however, it’s Zelda’s niece, and the brunette knows the lengths her witch had gone to bring the teen back from her last predicament.</p><p>So, when he turns his back to her, showcasing the never healing injuries where his wings were ripped. She charges at him, stabbing him deeply on one scar in his back. Lucifer falls to his knees in pain and tries to summon the empowering magic of the witches who gave their soul to him to stop her. To heal himself.</p><p>“If you won’t give me what’s mine,” the former demoness stabs him again on the other scar, “then I’ll just have to take it…” she finishes, pushing him to the ground and straddling him. His celestial blood pours from his wounds and she presses tightly, stealing his blood from where it flows.</p><p>As her hands are about to reach her mouth, she feels then what she hadn’t lost. Lilith feels every ounce of her magic freely rushing through her every inch. Yet Celestial blood always gave her a nice high. She drinks it… and as she does… her memories return.</p><p>She feels the all-encompassing voice of her creator answering her call of his unspeakable name. Telling her she should just wait, that things would be better. But she doesn’t trust in him, everything it’s broken when the mate He gave her had forced himself on her and there was no father to protect her.</p><p>The first woman lands on her knees by the calm pond at the Garden, and she checks her image on the surface. Her blue eyes shining brightly filled with a liquid that makes everything all blurrier. She doesn’t even feel the scrapes on her knees as she trembles, embracing herself as she cries. With a punch she gets rid of the mockery of her own brokenness, the last thing she sees inside the pond of the Garden, are the ripples of her red hair as she stands and runs.</p><p>She knows she’s being followed by his angels, but they make themselves scarce from her sight and try not to interfere as it was ordered to them. When she finally reaches the shore of what later mortals would call the Red Sea, she sees herself and has to make a double-take. There are no more red tresses in her head but a dark, deep mane. She thinks that’s the way her body mourns Eden. But she doesn’t dwell on it.</p><p>When night falls and cold menaces to take her last breath away, she growls and out of a sudden, there’s a fire. Bezaliel appears then and tells her that in exchange for her suffering, there were gifts granted to her. “I don’t understand,” she frowns in confusion and the angel caresses her cheek.</p><p>“Lilitu, you are the first of your kind. You are a daimon,” she nods, not quite understanding what it means. It’s the first word she learns outside the ones they needed in the garden. One whose meaning she had forgotten during the millennia she had lived.</p><p>Is that following morning when a creature tries to attack her that Lilitu raises her hand and her attacker falls dead. She carves the body for meat and covers her body with its fur to keep herself warm, and against all odds…. Lilith survives. Impressing the creatures that roam along the bank of the sea.</p><p>They never try to harm her. However, she finds herself seduced by the carnality they showcase for all to see. One day, she simply mates with them, and her first creatures are born. Three beings from the sky come to seek her, and they launch on her the first curse. “A hundred of your children shall perish every day,” they say, and as they do a hundred creatures around the shore, fall to the ground. It’s the worst punishment she knows. It makes her hate her creator.</p><p>Lilith doesn’t know though, that’s not her creator, the one who sent those celestials to her, but the one who fell to Earth months after that. As she nurses him to health, he tells her he can stop her curse, and he does.</p><p>The first daimon doesn’t understand yet that the celestial magic used to punish her is the same that had lifted it from her bones. When the next day comes and her children don’t perish… she feels utterly in debt with the creature she is nursing back to health.</p><p>Lilith takes a deep breath, shaking her head from the memories of her past. She turns him around so she can see his face. Lucifer is as weak as the first time they met, and he’s bleeding just in the same way. Yet, this time no Daimon is willing to help him. No… this time, she connects the dots. Lilith realizes his magic was both the curse, and the veil lifted. The first witch feels the weight of the children she lost, and hope for the one that’s hidden somewhere in the mortal realm.</p><p>As she looks at him, her memories flood with images of how she walked him to her cave, where a blue fire had raged at her will. Of the creation of the realm by her hand and those of her children, fearful of the expansion of Adam’s reign over the mortal world once he too had been expelled out of the Garden.</p><p>She sees years and years passing by fast as they grew hell from the ground up. It’s not until then that she understands he was using her for this purpose. For her to create the place where he could reign without the God or the Goddess’ interference.  </p><p>Her memory stops on a day when she walked out of their cave, the entrance to the realm they were carving inch by inch, and breathes in as nature captivates her. Curiosity taking the best of her, she walks around and mixes with the mortals without them noticing her. She reaches the top of what they call a mountain and feels Bezaliel's presence beside her.</p><p>“There are more similar to you, Lilitu,” Bezaliel tells her.</p><p>“Daimons?” She asks, and the angel shakes his head.</p><p>“Witches, they call themselves….” He informs her. The celestial caresses her cheek and smiles. “Lilitu, the one whose name you didn’t call, asked me to remind you, that the day will come than one of your kind will be born and it will be as it wasn’t with Adam. Now, I must return, and so should you.” Bezaliel says and leaves a kiss on her temple before returning to the skies.</p><p>She remembers her eagerness to get to Lucifer and tell him what she had learned. “Witches, you say? Learn more about them, dear, will you?” he asks softly and pecks her lips tenderly. Months later, when she returns from her travels, he tells her he needs more followers.</p><p>“You know Lilith, you’ve seen beings that mortal called gods disappear along with their realms. We are condemned to do so, too... Unless we have people who worship us. Me… as a celestial.”</p><p>“Ho-how we can manage that?” she wonders, confused by his words. Afraid that one day they would disappear and her existence would be nothing but remains of a world that wasn’t even populated by mortal beings. “A book, and a blood oath.” He explains to her how it will work, and with a smile, she waves her hand and creates the book.</p><p>“It won’t work without a powerful sacrifice,” he adds, kisses her palm, and cuts it open. A drop of her blood falls onto the pages. “You need to write your name.” Lucifer pecks her lips and a quill appears in her hand.</p><p>
  <em>Lilitu</em>
</p><p>The first line is marred with her bloody name, and the equilibrium was broken for the first time. The Earth shook violence with it. Around the globe, earthquakes took over, and volcanos erupted. In their chambers in Pandemonium, Lilith fell to her knees, a hand raised to press her chest as she heaved, not understanding what was happening to her. Beside her, Lucifer rises empowered by her magic and smirks, even so, he takes care of her since he still needed her to grow his reign of repression.</p><p>As he pretended to care for her, the one signature turned into dozens. Changing him one by one, until there was nothing left of his handsome being. That day, he slapped her, confining her to a cell where he had abused Lilith for the first time. Once she had been properly punished and there was nothing left of her but a crumpled mess of wounds and bruises, Lucifer gave her the only gift he could. He made her the horrifying being that she had come to know as herself... and Madam Satan was born.</p><p>Along the way, with all the mistreatment, with all the pain and the constant feeling of being out of air. Lilith forgot about being a Daimon and became a demoness.</p><p>Lucifer growls underneath her, and she looks at him. Formerly repressed memories filling the blanks in ways she never knew they were missing. “Do you remember, darling, when we first met?” she asks him, who groans painfully underneath her. He tries to woe her. The charming angel she once thought she loved makes an appearance. “Let’s not spoil our perfect moment. Hmm?” she tells him, standing up.</p><p>Lilith trails the spear along his chest as she thinks how stupid she was all this time. How blind… “I could kill you with this blade. But that would end your suffering, and well… where’s the fun in that?” she asks him, but truly it’s about payback. An eye for an eye, of sorts.</p><p>“Instead… I banish you from the Court of Hell and from my sight. I cast you out to wander the mortal realm, like the beggar you are.”</p><p>“Lilitu…” he chuckles, unable to stand up because of the loss of blood. “You don’t have that power… It’s my realm, remember? It’s me who they want as a King. Darling, you are nothing but a whore. Your demons didn’t want you to rule over them when you were a demoness. They will want you even less now that you are not even a demon! ”</p><p>And Lilith laughs… “Oh, but I never was a demon. You knew this… You knew that wasn’t the name they gave to me, and the one of my kind. Am I wrong?” she asks, straddling him once more, an amused expression on her face.</p><p>“You were a demon! I made you one!”</p><p>“Yes, of course… with my power, by binding to you my magic and that of the witches that signed my book. Witches convinced by my actions and my devotion to you. But, you’ll see…” she chuckles. “The book doesn’t exist anymore. You can’t do shit about anything. You can’t harm me anymore… Not when I know you are just a cast out celestial and I… I am a Daimon.”</p><p>“A Daimon?” he splutters.</p><p>“Oh, let’s not be coy… you always knew what I was. It’s the only reason you battled for Heaven knowing you were going to lose... Because you knew I was roaming the Earth. Me… The only Daimon in existence at that time. The only being powerful enough and naïve enough, to give you what you wanted. You won’t get it anymore...” There’s a dangerous glint in her eyes.</p><p>“Even so, Daimon or not, you are destined to be alone! Who would want such a pitiful creature?” Lilith laughs, wholeheartedly.</p><p>“Oh, but don’t you know, Lucifer?” She asks and leans forward until her mouth is next to his ear. “There’s not only just one of me anymore.” He searches her face, not believing her words until he finds there’s nothing but the truth etched on the first witch’s expression.</p><p>“Zelda Spellman.” He says, without believing it. “She’s Godlike too? A-a Daimon?” Lucifer questions. “No wonder I could never find her…” he mutters to himself.</p><p>“Well, yes. Now you know why... And let’s be sure to make things all the better, darling. Allow me to add this to your penance,” she smiles manically. In her hand, a transparent orb appears. “I, Lilitu, first Daimon of Earth, daughter of the God, bind your magic to this sphere, so you can never damage another soul.” Dark smoke fills the glass and his blood turns to a bright red. “Now, chop-chop… I’m tired of you…. Of you go, eternal but mortal-like,” she says, remembering what he had tried to do to her. Lucifer vanishes from underneath her, dropped in a tropical jungle, powers stripped.</p><p>‘<em>It’s done,</em>’ she says to Zelda, as she drops to the floor and cries for all that she gave away. ‘<em>Come back to me</em>,’ the redhead’s voice comes clear in her mind. Yet, she can’t… not just now, when there’s much she needs to fix in the realm of her creation, and accept of herself before she can even try to convince Zelda of what they truly are.</p><p>Daimons… God-like… Each of them Daughters of one Creator... </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>From the Ancient Greek daimon (δαίμων: "god", "godlike", "power", "fate"), which originally referred to a lesser deity or guiding spirit.<br/>The word is derived from Proto-Indo-European *daimon "provider, divider (of fortunes or destinies)" </p><p>I know... I'm such a nerd... :D</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0056"><h2>56. Chapter 56</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>It just keeps growing! Enjoy.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>A week goes by too damn quickly, Zelda realizes as she fights with herself to stop herself from contacting Lilith again. She had tried, day and night, since she sent her to Hell, since Sabrina’s birthday and following disappearance act.</p><p>Zelda Spellman was never one for begging. Unless it was in the room where she would plead and writhe in pleasure like the most faithful of the whores. No, she wasn’t above begging in bed, but searching for Lilith as an enamored fool was becoming just too pitiful, even for her.</p><p>For five days straight, the High Priestess had called her, pleaded with her, begged her, and even prayed to her she would return. Never disclosing how much she truly needed the comfort of the other woman’s arms. Perchance, if she confessed her need for Lilith’s presence, she would’ve achieved better results. But no, a week of unanswered mental chats later, she was done.</p><p>Lilith could figure out everything by herself. She could go to Hell… or rather, remain in Hell for as long as she wanted to. No, Zelda didn’t care…. Or so she tried to convince herself. “What if she’s dead? What if Lucifer killed her and there is no news about it? No one who knows I’m waiting for word of her status?” The redhead wonders out loud, only to be found at it by her nephew.</p><p>“I take you don’t have any news about… Lilith?” he asks, lowering his voice to barely above a whisper as he mentions the former demoness’s name. The eldest Spellman hates herself because she can feel her eyes tearing up at this question and finds herself unable to utter a stupid word. Instead, she shakes her head once. ‘No.’ Ambrose's arm stretches across her vast desk and seeks a trembling hand.</p><p>“I’m sure she’s all right, Auntie. We both know if someone can take care of herself it would be her,” Ambrose tries. His voice reassuring and the light squeeze of his hand on her just a simple show of how much he truly cares about his colder aunt.</p><p>“Thank you, Ambrose,” she lets out, as the back of her free hand finds her teary eyes and she rubs them, trying to clean the tears that aren’t falling. Willing her make up to remain as it was before the crying.</p><p>A blink of an eye later and her makeup it’s perfect, not a hint of her emotions shows, and her nephew winces. He loathes seeing his Aunt Zee suffering, but he also dislikes seeing her shouldering her emotions and hiding them who knew where to be dealt with later, if ever.</p><p>“Any news about Sabrina? Or her… her corpse?” She asks, her hands trembling as she thinks about what should’ve happened. How she should’ve opposed to bringing her niece’s soul back to the other body that lied unmoving in their morgue. How by letting Sabrina truly sacrifice herself they would’ve lost her for good, but they would at least know where she was and what had happened to her.</p><p>Truth was… not knowing was far more damning than knowing she was resting in their yard. There was some hope, if they had her niece buried, she thought as she eyed by the corner of her eye the box that Marie… no, Baron Samdi, had given to her. She could’ve used it… called in a favor she knew would’ve been expensive… yet, having her niece alive and well would’ve outrun any price. Everything would’ve been worthy, even her own death if that meant that Hilda, Ambrose, and even that silly warlock of Nick Stratch would get to have years of Sabrina’s antics.</p><p>“None,” Ambrose answers, crooking his head while wondering where his aunt was right then. “I guess we taught her right, and she’s exceptional now at not being tracked.” He chuckles mirthlessly. The warlock knows his cousin might be exceptional in some things, but knowing how to take care of herself was never her forte. So, he can’t seem to get rid of the worry he carries about how she’s surviving somewhere in the world all by herself.</p><p>Besides, they all know that Blackwood has escaped. Prudence had made it abundantly clear with her screams and the string of curses she had let out against her father and Lilith. Since among the few things he gave away, was that his Mark of Cain came from the former demoness. However, they don’t know he has found Sabrina. Or that he is nursing her to some bizarre version of health. Hoping that she will use her powers to summon the void and finally end with it all.</p><p>No, they don’t know, and thus they don’t worry about him more than they should’ve. They also don’t worry about that weird church that’s getting more adepts with each passing day. Or how Judas and Judith are living now with Mary Wardwell, the same mortal that once had killed their High Priestess. No, they don’t have time… why dwell on the mortal antics when the end of the world as they knew it could be at the next turn of the page. Everyone’s future hanging from that one day, when Sabrina Spellman Morningstar awoke tired and angry, allowing the last of the terrors to take over everything they once knew and loved… creating nothing but emptiness. Taking them all into the vast expansion of nothingness.</p><p>As if she had come back from the dead again, Zelda takes a deep breath and straightens in her chair. Her entire body vibrating with a new kind of energy. She stands up, ready to bolt to the Academy’s foyer, following this need that grows deep inside her core to find what she felt. She doesn’t care about the worried glance her nephew lets on her side.</p><p>“Get back to the mortuary… I’m sure there’s something we are missing,” she states. “Search on Marie’s… Baron Samdi’s book… whatever this is, it is might be there, and we are just too blind to see it. Don’t focus on Lilith’s prophecy, go further.” She instructs him. Zelda hasn’t got her hands on the book. She had only allowed herself a soft caress on the dark cover of it once.</p><p>“What is it, Auntie?” he asks, seeing her watching the door unseeing. The short expanse of skin at sight either blushing furiously or covered by goosebumps. Her green eyes filled with a glint he hasn’t seen before, and there was also this wild, fierce energy that feels anything but threatening. It comes from his Aunt, he realizes. “Lilith…” she whispers, almost unbelievingly.</p><p>“Lilith? This energy…” he tries. They had spoken about the way some of them seemed to be more powerful now. How some members of their coven, like Melvin, felt stronger and some, like Prudence, felt now weaker. As if the energies that kept them strong were rearranged somehow. They all felt it too. How the High Priestess energies now overtake any space she’s in. They can feel her across the building. Yet, what they don’t know is how truly contained she is.</p><p>“She’s coming,” the redhead says, smiling brightly, and as Ambrose feels another powerful magical being approaching the academy, he disappears into the Mortuary. When he blinks, he finds himself in his room. Shaking his head, he finds the tome he has been reading on and off –Marie’s book- and heads downstairs for he’s sure he will need a tea to shake his still trembling body from the excited energies he felt before he was forcefully transported here.</p><p>With no Ambrose to stop her back at the Academy, Zelda rushes through rooms and hallways until she growls and transports herself to the foyer. At that very moment, the front door opens to let her Lily in, and the High Priestess shudders as a memory of the time when she had to refuse asylum to her love under the watchful eye of that traitor of Samedi, comes washing over her.</p><p>“My love…” Lilith whispers in awe after finally seeing her. Zelda doesn’t move from her position. Only embracing herself by the middle as if ready to hear and protect herself from the pack of lies that will be opened for her. The first witch winces, because she can see the wary stance of the High Priestess. The protective embrace she’s keeping, and she wants to kick herself for not having answered her. But Hell was only once an easy realm… right when she had started it.</p><p>Pinching the bridge of her nose, Lilith sighs. “I won’t lie to you.” She starts. Zelda snorts and raises a questioning eyebrow, “that’d be a first.”</p><p>“That hurts. I never lied to you after we got together…. I just hid who I truly was. Just like you still do.” She mumbles the last part. Truly, the first woman doesn’t really want to start a fight. She wants to rush to her love’s arm and hide her face in the crook of her neck as she falls into a deep, warm embrace that heals what she doesn’t know is broken. Fixing what she doesn’t know can be repaired.</p><p>“Like <em>I</em> still do?” the redhead questions. Her cigarette makes an appearance as she takes a nervous drag, all the time keeping one hand tightly wrapped around her middle.</p><p>“That’s not what I…” Lilith stops herself and sighs. “I’m sorry. I should’ve contacted you before. What can I say? I was tremendously busy.”</p><p>“That you couldn’t even spare a thought towards me? I’ll need more explanations than simple words, Lily.” Zelda huffs, a cloud of smoke creating a curtain that protects her pained eyes from falling square into icy blue eyes that shine gloriously with love.</p><p>“Lucifer is gone. I cast him out of Hell and trapped his magic in a ball that’s hidden somewhere safe,” Lilith explains quickly. “I had to stay behind and reorganize the mess that my realm was. After finding some of my remaining children, the few original ones that somehow Lucifer had spared after he returned to hell…” she sighed, remembering how he had killed all the demons who had sided with her. “Well, the ones who were faithful to me and I organized everything as fast as we could… I’m sorry,” she apologizes again, taking a step closer and almost entering Zelda’s personal space.</p><p>Checking the room, remembering that day when they found themselves like this under Marie’s watchful eyes. The first witch casts a protective bubble around them.</p><p>Once she knows their privacy is safe, Lilith raises a hand to touch Zelda’s cheek, and the redhead lets out a shuddery breath. Their forehead’s touch. “I truly didn’t want to worry you,” the first woman whispers, her words ghost caresses on the soft lips that now are closer to her. “Honestly, I wanted to spare you, love. Hoping you could make your own choices about things that were dropped on us, without us ever having a say on it.” She adds before she feels Zelda’s chilly hands reaching for her neck and pulling her closer until warm lips are moving softly over her own.</p><p>They kiss for what it seems like forever. It tastes like homecoming and hot chocolate on a cold winter night, and Lilith lets herself be carried away in this journey she’s for once not doing alone. Until they part, all panting breaths, swollen lips, and glazy eyes. They share a knowing smile and they peck each other’s cheeks.</p><p>Without warning, Lilith cries. She throws herself to the redhead, broken by the way she’s been so lovingly watched. Hiding her face into the crook of the High Priestess neck, as the redhead’s hands find purchase in the low of her back. Her hands trace fiery lines as she moves them up and down in a comforting path until Lilith sobers up. Her throat hurting from repeating ‘I’m sorry’ so many times into her love’s neck.</p><p>“What are you sorry about, love?” Zelda finally asks as Lilith takes a step back, and she can see her tear-stained face, red and stuffy nose, and smeared makeup. The Directrix thinks she hadn’t ever seen something as beautiful and worth protecting, like Lilith’s vulnerability.</p><p>“I couldn’t fix it. Zelda… I tried to fix the unbalance, but I couldn’t. I burned the book of the beast, hoping that by freeing…” ‘you, us,’ she wants to say but doesn’t dare, “all the witches from the contract that never should have existed the balance would be reached and you would be free from fulfilling our prophecy. Unless you truly wanted to… wanted me…” Lilith finishes, her eyes glued to the floor. Her hands tightly gripping the fabric of Zelda’s dress at hip level.</p><p>“Oh, Lily…” Zelda whispers. Her hands quickly working up to clear the tears away. Her magic tingling on the first witch's skin as her makeup is fixed, and all trace of crying is forgotten underneath the redhead’s spell. With that done, the High Priestess pecks Lilith’s lips softly and places one strand of hair behind her ear.</p><p>“Dear, I know you desired for me to be the one to fulfill your prophecy, but it can’t be me. I’m no male and I’m not…” she takes a deep shuddery breath before she must acknowledge out loud and in front of her love what she truly feels. “I’m not enough, Lily.” Her voice trembles and her jaw quivers as she gives Lilith a tear-stained smile. “I’m just a lowly witch who has no affair into fixing what was broken beyond her comprehension. I wish I was, love… but I’m not.”</p><p>“No. Don’t you see?… It’s you.”</p><p>“Lilith… please…” She whispers, her voice hoarse with tears that she fights not to let out. Her green eyes were covered with a watery glint. Her lips were red but not from kissing but from keeping her from crying. Zelda fights with all her being as she waits for her love to realize she is not enough. She never was.</p><p>“Oh, Zelda,” Lilith lets out, coming to stand closer. Hugging her tightly, resting the redhead’s forehead in her own. “You once told me there was a note in your bassinet when the Spellman’s found you. It was no joke, love.”</p><p>“You’ll see…. I drank Lucifer’s blood and my memories… they were restored. Yet, even before that, I had a fortuitous encounter with Baron Samdi. He also shared one of his memories with me,” Lilith says, and sucks her lower lip, waiting for a reaction to the last part of her words. When none comes, she searches for a soft cheek once more. “despite all you believe, despite how much you belittle yourself from that note… it was all true, love.”</p><p>“Wh-what?” She frowns, and her brow furrows, yet Lilith doesn’t let her go.</p><p>“Oh, love. In the beginning, there were two beings. A God and a Goddess… and God and Goddess fought. To make Her happy… He created humans… and it pissed Her off, He was supposed to create me on Her image… but He only managed to make me in his. With time passing by, the God remained nameless. Only I had ever dared to call him by his true name. The Goddess, though… She took millions of names to help those she thought deserving while trying not to intervene. And so, I was never alone they were watching over me. To help me understand I had stumbled upon my path, She granted me some gifts. They made me a… Daimon. My hair… my beautiful hair that used to shine in the same orange hue of twilight, became an ebony one as their gifts landed on my body the moment I walked out of Eden.”</p><p>“Now, you, darling… you are Hekate’s daughter, the Goddess’s girl, as much as I am God’s daughter. We, dear… we were meant to find each other because you are like me. A Daimon. We balance out, Zelda… Don’t you feel it? Don’t you see that what I’ve tried would’ve been impossible, without you by my side?”</p><p>“The prophecy… it mentions an Heir... a male…” Zelda's voice trembles.</p><p>“You’ll see, no one else can be my other half, because I’m created on his image. God created man in His image, man and female he created them,” Lilith says quoting the bible, and Zelda flinches, recognizing the words of the book she once despised. “No descendants of his creation can be my other half, love. Because for that to exist, it should’ve been created by Her.” She adds, searching green eyes.</p><p>“No, it can’t be.” The High Priestess adds, and the First Witch sees the panic taking control of the beautiful orbs.</p><p>“You resurrected, Zelda. Yourself. Alone. Baron Samdi was near your corpse and he was forbidden to act. You got yourself back to life and then, you resurrected Hilda.”</p><p>“No… It was Hecate. She didn’t want me to die, she needed a Priestess for her coven. And Hilda… Hilda is alive thanks to the coven’s magic and Hecate’s divine intervention.” Zelda says, denying ever being the one whose energies raised and were shared. Not remembering how her own tear was the one who truly brought her sister back to life.</p><p>“No, love…” Lilith whispers, clearing some tears from her cheeks with the pad of her thumb. “That was you… only you. That day you allowed yourself to let go of your fears and trust in your powers because there were women surrounding you. You felt safe. That circle of witches, and mortals… was only an excuse and you know it. You can ask Rosalind Walker about how she felt a part of herself being detached. The part of her that comes from you.”</p><p>“It makes little sense, Lilith.” She states, stretching to her full height and convincing herself of how utterly ridiculous this sounds. “Why are you torturing me like this? I protected you the best I could! I helped you to the best of my skills! I kept your child safe!”</p><p>“Our child,” the former demoness states, not leaving space for questioning.</p><p>“Oh, no… here we go again. I can’t be the other parent of your child, Lilith. How could I?” Lilith chuckles.</p><p>“It makes perfect sense, love. Once you think about it, it’s just the perfect design He once thought for the Earth, but he couldn’t create alone. Not without Her.” She smiles, and Zelda frowns. “I can bear children, love. Isn’t that part of the myths and stories you grew hearing and reading about me? That I had to steal sperm to create my children? That’s not a total lie… I can carry them to term. And you… you said yourself, you can’t. You don’t know why either. There’s no mortal medicine or magical explanation about why you haven’t. Yet, you can give life, love. You always could. Don’t you see? How many children have you birthed in the most unfavorable conditions? How many of them have died under your watch?”</p><p>“None! Yet between helping to birth them and willing them into existence, there’s a lot of logic that defies any ideas of what you might think is true.” She counters, embracing herself defensively.</p><p>“But haven’t you? Haven’t you willed them to be safely delivered into your arms? And then that happening? Have you not willed for Constance's firstborn to be a girl instead of the twin boys fate told you Blackwood was having?” Lilith questions.</p><p>“Yes… I willed for a girl…” Zelda's brows furrow harshly. “but…”</p><p>“No buts, love,” the first woman says, searching for icy hands and grasping them softly between her own warmer ones. A show of how they perfectly fit in the opposing temperatures of their hands. “You give life, Zelda. You resurrected yourself. It was you who brought Hilda back. And it was you, the one who brought me back from wherever my true self was hiding. Life is your gift to give. Is my gift to carry it for you.”</p><p>“You, darling, are the Goddess’s daughter. She made you in his image and completed you with what he had missed of her. I’m the God’s daughter, he made me in her image, yet instead, he completed me with parts of himself. Unlike Adam, who was made from the other half of the mud in which He created me, I was never torn in two, there was no Eve for me. You weren't part of someone either. We weren’t pieces of a soul, but two complete beings made in their likeness. We fit together because we are flesh and blood extensions of them. Not two halves of a whole but two wholes willing to accommodate.”</p><p>“What do you want from me, Lilith? There’s nothing more I can give you that I haven’t already given freely to you…. There’s nothing more left…”</p><p>“I want you, Zelda. You are all I ever wanted. All I ever longed for….” She sighs. “As I’ve said, Lucifer is dead. I drank his blood. It didn’t bring the balance back. I tried, Zelda. I tried it all, so we won’t have to do this. So, you won’t have to sacrifice yourself to me. Hoping you wouldn’t have to sacrifice yourself so there’s a world to live in…”</p><p>“It can’t be me, Lilith… I wish it could but…” A soft peck quiets her.</p><p>“Yet, you’ll see, love… I have this bone…” she says taking it out of the infernal gown she’s wearing. “It belongs to the only person I’ve saved. A young witch who was being burned alive… Some warlocks… They took her rib to keep her restrained,” the first witch whispers softly and then raises her eyes to watch her as the pieces of the puzzle fall into place. “I know that if I were to use it to bound her, it will be you, the one who wouldn’t be able to move.”</p><p>“What are you saying?” The High Priestess asks with a trembling voice.</p><p>“Allow me to return it to its rightful owner. It will only work if it is truly yours,” Lilith smiles. Softly pushing the bone through the fabric of the redhead’s clothes and further inside until it sits where it used to be centuries ago. For once in decades, Zelda feels complete.</p><p>“Lilith…” Zelda warns her, a mere gasp of air. One last resistance.</p><p>“Haven’t you read the prophecies, dear? You are the Heir of Earth. It’s clearly written! As clear as we belong to each other.”</p><p>It’s most likely the choice of words that has the redhead squirming in place. Lilith realizes that too late. Zelda Spellman doesn’t want to belong to anyone else. She can’t survive another being doing with her whatever it pleased. Hecate’s daughter knows Lilith is no Blackwood, but fears are fears and this one is petrifying.</p><p>“No!” the redhead shouts. Her eyes are bloodshot with pain and panic written all over them. “Whatever you think you know, it’s not true.” Zelda lets out teleporting away.</p><p>Lilith wants to follow her, but she knows the redhead enough to understand that the last thing she needs now is someone hovering. No, Zelda Spellman needs space to dwell in the information she’s gotten and to mourn about the things she will lose.</p><p>Hadn’t she just taken a week to do so herself? </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0057"><h2>57. Chapter 57</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hum... this one has some mention of child abuse (just a description of the first time Zelda's hit as a child) and I realize this might be triggering for some people.<br/>I apologize if I never warned you guys before about the violence.<br/>Anyhow... you are here so... enjoy :D</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She drops herself elegantly on the one couch she had deemed hers over the years of sitting here, at the library of the Spellman’s Mortuary. Zelda’s mind is reeling with all the information that Lilith dropped on her just moments ago. There’s too much to understand, and even more, to analyze, a lot of information to pick, prod, dissect and try to mold so she can process it all.</p><p>There’s fear too.</p><p>The High Priestess notices that tingly sensation of dread that it’s growing in the low of her back and coursing through her spine to take hold of her shoulders, forcing her to sit ramrod straight. Panic settles around her neck as the embrace of a warm lover. It takes her breath away.</p><p>Why is she so terrified of what was disclosed for her ears only? Why? She knows her Lily wouldn’t force her to own her side of the unknown deal that binds them together.</p><p>“You belong to me,” she hears again in her mind, and it’s not Lilith’s voice but Faustus as he pounds into her unwilling and unresponsive body. His breath the one she feels in her cheek, and his hand the one she feels closing about her throat. “No,” she whimpers, shaking her head, not allowing herself to drive her memories even further down that path… Willing herself not to think about those weeks under his utter control and the total devastation he left behind.</p><p>“Lilith wouldn’t do that to you…” she mumbles, but the fear remains nonetheless. After all, how many times had the former demoness hidden something from her? “She never laid a finger on you, you were the one who had to do all the chasing, Zelda. You waited for her… and when the time came, she also waited for you… so why? Why is it that this shakes you so badly?”</p><p>It’s not Lilith what she is afraid of. Deep down, she knows this. Perchance, rushing out of the academy and away from her arms, was just her body flee response activated by the fear of belonging to someone again. Yet, deep down, she knew it wasn’t it. It wasn’t fear of belonging. It was the fear of accepting she wasn’t who she thought she was... again.</p><p>That word nagging her brain, though... Where had she read it before? Waving her hand in the air, a book falls into her lap as she searches for something more about it. She feels silly because the book in her lap it’s almost a child’s book of demonology, and to make it worse it opens in the description of Demons. She notices then a little mark showing a note at the end and frowns.</p><p>As she searches for the right page, she finds her cigarette, takes a drag, and slowly releases the smoke out of her lungs with practiced ease. The redhead frowns. “δαίμων” it reads. “Daimon denotes a spirit or divine power. Must not be confused with word demon,” she reads out loud as if she needs to hear the words to understand them properly.</p><p>Zelda waves her hand once more, and a heavier tome falls into her lap. She flips through pages of ancient Greek text until somehow she finds what she was looking for, and another book flies to her side, one that comes from some mysterious source, but she knows is a first translated copy of a book that survived the fire of the Library of Alexandria.</p><p>Her hand finds her hair, as she scratches her head trying to figure out how she hadn’t seen these things before, how hadn’t she pieced this puzzle together. “δαίμων, daimon… godlike, and provider or divider of fortunes and destinies. Benevolent being of both mortal and deity nature. Being that might remain invisible to all, yet are known by their acts. Homer’s work uses both theoí (θεοί ‘gods’) and daímones (δαίμονες ‘godlike’) to showcase they are similar in kind and yet not the same. In Alexander the Great cult, it was not him but his guiding daemon, the one venerated.”</p><p>“Do you remember everything you did?” Zelda had asked Lilith once as they lied side by side, entangled, and she stroked the brown, soft mane lovingly. The brunette had chuckled mirthlessly. “No, dear. I forgot most of it already, and the world has changed so much that’s more difficult to find a place that brings back a memory. Why?”</p><p>“Curiosity, I suppose,” the redhead shrugged. “I recall little of my life either, and mine is far shorter than yours. I keep only some memories that are too painful or too close to my heart, I suppose. I don’t even remember Edward’s face without looking at a photograph.” She confessed in a trembling whisper.</p><p>“What’s the best and oldest memory you have?” Lilith asked, moving to the side to start another cigarette. She took a drag before sharing it with Zelda, keeping it between her own fingers so it wouldn’t stain her redhead’s hands. “Hilda’s birth. You?”</p><p>“There was a time when one person I helped accomplish his deepest, darkest desires in exchange for his mortal soul decided that his people should venerate me for what he achieved. He said they were free because of me. It was weird, it was the first time I learned I could hear prayers too.”</p><p>“Really? Someone that I might know?” Zelda asked, curiosity shining through green smart eyes. “Alexandros III ho Makedȏn,” Lilith shrugged, “he called himself, Alexander The Great. A bit presumptuous if you think about it.”</p><p>“A-Alexander the… Great?” the redhead coughed almost spluttered the wine that she had just sipped. “Yeah, you know of him?” the brunette asked, confused.</p><p>“Of course! He was… Are you telling me he achieved everything because he is another mortal who sold his soul to the devil?” She asked, and Lilith laughed. “Oh, love, I’ve lost the count of the number of mortal wars I took part in. There is always someone willing to sell their souls for mortal gratifications. They have no clue, no real understanding of what happens with their souls afterward.”</p><p>Shaking herself from her memory, Zelda’s eyes fell on the other book she had reached for. “Demons can be guardians and wanderers. The first ones are attached to a place and thus limited topographically. Such are the ones protecting the underworld. Death and plague accompanied the wanderers, the agents of chaos that arise from the world beyond creation. One can never destroy the wanderers, it’s said evil is their only motivation. Most likely, they create havoc as an answer to some request of those we call mortals and have not yet learned or don’t care about the payment of dealing with those who guard the underworld. We cannot take demons lightly. Daimons… Despite presenting similar skills, they fall under a completely different subject of study as they are far more advanced in the scale, closer to the Gods. Rightful first-hand descendants of them. According to the Mysteries of Isis, there’s only one Daimon alive created by our Mother’s mate. In millennia to come, a mate for it should be born from Isis’ hands to fulfill Her words.”</p><p>She drops the book away, feeling almost burned by it and the last words she reads. “You, darling, are the Goddess’s daughter. She made you in his image and completed you with what he had missed from her. She took millions of names,” Lily’s voice says in her head.</p><p>A magic enters the house, and she recognizes it easily as that of her sister. So, in desperate need of something to get her mind off this rat wheel her mind has become, Zelda decides to search for her. Not before hiding the books back in their place, and not before she has taken some time, so it wouldn’t be too obvious that she was reaching for help.</p><p>As far as Hilda’s memories of Ambrose Spellman can stretch, she can’t find one of a day he hadn’t been nose deep in a book. She could say the same about Zelda.</p><p>Hilda feels both Ambrose’s more playful magic, and the controlled, yet immense energy that, for a week now, she recognized as her sister’s magic. The younger Spellman sister concludes easily they are both at home, yet only one of them would leave behind a book at the kitchen table. That wouldn’t be her sister.</p><p>She reaches closer to the tome, noticing it was the one her nephew had carried around for weeks. Some sort of prophecy book. Of course, she had seen him wander around the house with it tucked under his arm as he read through it until the terrors appeared and everything circled back to defeat them. Back then, on what now seemed like freer times, when the book seemed to be a deep secret for Ambrose’s eyes only. Now, though, the book was there over the kitchen table and there was no one around.</p><p>Curiosity winning the best of her, she touched the black leather of its cover and scaring the heaven out of her; the books flew away from her touch, falling open onto the floor. Hoping to return it to the place it was and no one being the wiser, she walks to it. Kneeling to grab it, she flinches before her hand reaches for it, afraid that I will go flying again.</p><p>It doesn’t. So, she picks it up, her eyes falling on the open text. Her eyes widen as she continues reading it. As she finishes that section, she drops it on the table. She closes it, taking a couple of steps away. All color has drained from her face, and she can’t help but yelp when, in her backward escaping route, she falls into Ambrose’s chest.</p><p>“Holy Hecate!” she shouts, placing a hand over her racing heart.</p><p>“Auntie? Are you okay?” Ambrose asks, noticing how pale she had gone. As mortals would say, his Auntie looked as if she had just seen a ghost. “Auntie, what’s wrong?”</p><p>“I… Where did you get that from… Ambrose?” She gulps, pointing to the book that lies unmoving over the kitchen table.</p><p>“Ah, when Aunt Zee denied asylum to Lilith, she came to ask me if I could help her find… a book before she had to leave the premises… Marie found us and she gave this one to Lilith, marked some prophecy she thought our favorite demoness needed to read. Then before Lucifer caught her, Lilith transported it to Auntie Zee’s office, and I was there when it appeared.” He shrugs.</p><p>“This… prophecy… the one Marie thought Lilith should read… Can you show me which one is it?” Hilda asks. Ambrose looks at her confused for a second, but then again, it will be a fresh pair of eyes. Of course, he shows her the same she had just read. “What you think it’s about?” Hilda wonders awkwardly.</p><p>“It’s complementary to one at the Codex Prognostica. One entry related to Lilith herself. My thoughts are that since demons forged the codex as they tortured angels to spill their beans, the Codex Prophecy is more Lilith’s centered. Whereas, since this book comes from a more catholic environment, it’s not about the demoness but about who is her other half. I spoke with Auntie Zee about it…”</p><p>“You did?” the blonde chuckles nervously.</p><p>“Well, yes, but about the contents of the Codex Prognostica. I haven’t had time to bring this one to her yet. It seems that every time I’m about to, something happens, and they need us to solve other things. Why?”</p><p>“It’s just… these lines…” She stutters, shaking her head as she tries to decide if she should share this with her nephew or not. “I was there, Ambrose…” her voice so low that he had almost missed it.  </p><p>“You were there?” Ambrose enquires, to figure out if that was what his aunt had said. A nervous nod is the one answer he gets, it makes him burst with a renewed energy. It had escaped Zelda’s mouth that there was an unbalance tearing out the realms, creating chaotic entangles that had nothing to do with the terrors they’d faced. Perhaps, if his Aunt Hilda knew when and where… and hopefully about who the prophecy spoke about, they could fix that issue and things would fix themselves. Maybe even improve enough to get Sabrina back.</p><p>The young warlock stops himself for a second because he knows that by finding the one who would be meant to be Lilith’s other half, his Aunt would have to let her go. He isn’t sure he wants to be there when she deals with it. Or worst, be he the one who tells her who it might be.</p><p>“When? Who?” Ambrose asks, his words doubtful. Hilda sighs. “I… It was… hmm… You know how we never talk about your… your Auntie Zee’s dark baptism…” the blonde stutters and the warlock’s eyes widen. Could it be that he was right and his Aunt wrong, for once?</p><p>“Why are we talking about my dark baptism?” Zelda spats, frowning as she enters the room. “It was long ago, and it doesn’t need any mentioning.” She glares at Hilda, embracing herself.</p><p>“But… Zelds… someone wrote about it…” Hilda says.</p><p>“That’s impossible. You know, after we left that coven it was…” she stops herself before she says something she might regret. Yet, for once, Hilda looks at her, not cowering at her glare.</p><p>“After their no quite polite request for us… for you… to leave that coven, you mean? Or that they prohibited it to talk or write about the events of that night? That mentioning it could end up in death, and that was an order from the anti-pope itself? Or how that’s the reason we never talked about it?”</p><p>“Hilda,” she warns, looking sideways towards Ambrose. Yet, the blonde won’t have it. She grabs the book and starts reading out loud, “and on a dark moon, as dark as the Heir of Earth’s mane, he will sign his name away. With the first drop of his vital fluid, the blood moon will shine full and its power will drop to his head. Nature will welcome him with a feast, as equilibrium was largely missed before his arrival.” Hilda reads. “If that’s not exactly what happened then, Zelds…”</p><p>“I signed my soul away,” the redhead states firmly. “That’s what happened that night, and now I have it back, as the damned book I shouldn’t have signed is no more, and with we all are free of our contract,” Zelda rolls her eyes.</p><p>“That’s what it is?” Ambrose wonders.</p><p>“Yes. Lilith burned it. Hoping to re-establish the equilibrium. It didn’t quite work, but we are all feeling the results of it.”</p><p>“The new reorganization of magic? The reason Melvin is now far better, and Prudence not so much?” He questions.</p><p>Zelda sighs. “I know people like Faustus had their own deals with Lucifer. It’s not far-fetched to assume that the bloodline of those who were favored resulted also favored once they added their blood to the book. Thus, now that there’s no book to reorient the energies…”</p><p>“The favored are losing power and the true owners of that magic are now as they should have?” He wonders.</p><p>“That’s my guess…” Zelda says, and Ambrose is about to ask her to question Lilith about it when Hilda’s voice interrupts them.</p><p>“You won’t throw this conversation to the side as if it was not worthy of your time, sister. Now that we don’t belong to Lucifer, and there’s not even a contract for our souls anymore… you cannot shove what happened that night into a compartment, Zelds. Not when there’s a book, a prophecy, that talks about it.”</p><p>“If what Aunt Hilda says is true, Auntie Zee…” Ambrose tries with a soft tone that he hopes will share some reassurance. “Maybe I was right, and you….”</p><p>“NO.” She states, clenching her jaw.</p><p>“I can tell you. I was there…” Hilda says. “It was one of the darkest nights in the year. There was no moon to shine down on us, as we gathered in a clearing in the very old country. They set the altar in the middle. The coven was ready, and there she was. Your Auntie Zee. Clad in a black cloak, she lowered her hood, and her dark ebony hair shone with the light of the torches. It mesmerized me.” She started with bright eyes.</p><p>Before she could stop herself, Zelda was sharing her memories with them…</p><p>She raises her eyes to the sky, contemplating the black sky where not even a star seemed to be shining. As if it was mourning with her for what she was not. Moving her dark ebony tresses behind her shoulder, she wonders if she should do this. If she should sign her name away.</p><p>Chuckling mirthlessly, she clears one stubborn tear out of her cheek, and it finally settles on her mind that she wasn’t Zelda Spellman. Her life, her identity… everything she stood for, was nothing but a lie. She was some Satan forsaken child who had ended up in the Spellman cottage by some dumb luck.</p><p>Edward was waiting for her at the entrance of the clearing. A glance at his eyes had him smiling at her. She pulls her cloak over her head as it was customary for their coven and he stops her, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “Whatever happens from here now, remember, you’ll always be my little sister. I’ll always care for you.” He nods to the side and they walk in.</p><p>Zelda walks surely to the altar where she was about to sacrifice her name, her soul, to fit in a home that had never been hers. To honor a name that she shouldn’t have carried. Everything made much more sense now. Every stroke and punishment lay explained to her by those simple words, “you are not a Spellman,” uttered by who she thought as her mother earlier that day.</p><p>At sixteen years old, she squares her shoulders stoically as the High Priest approaches her and unties the bow of her cloak. Letting it fall to the uncharacteristically snow-covered soil. She clenches her jaw as the icy wind hit her skin, burning it as if warning her of the perils of the action she was about to take. Zelda can feel her High Priest’s eyes leering at her perked breast and their peaks that raise as an answer to the cold… all her body barely covered by a thin sheet of dark silk. She knew it was his Satan given right to take her the following night if the dark lord didn’t appear to make his own claim that night.</p><p>Avoiding that line of thoughts, she spares a glance over her shoulders and finds Edward’s reassuring smile. Their… his parents… frown harshly. And then, her green eyes fall into Hilda’s bright eyes that fill with admiration. For that look, of love and awe, and the feeling of knowing that someone loved her without boundaries, that her little sister looked up at her as a mentor of sorts, that everything she did would always be looked upon, taken as an example of what she should do… Zelda offers her hand to their High Priest and winks at her little sister who beams back at her.</p><p>A sharp blade slices her hand, a reminiscence of the hundreds of scars she would’ve had crisscrossing all over her body if wasn’t she a witch. If she wasn’t as good at healing as she had become. The knife digs deeper and she never even hisses, Zelda is too used to pain.</p><p>This simple cut was nothing against the lashings she had survived from the tender age of four when her so-called father had found Edward teaching her how to read.</p><p>She still remembers that night, when her Father had waited until everyone was asleep to take her to the barn. Standing up, she’d had followed him sleepily, not understanding why he’d asked her to disrobe herself. Cold and trembling, she stood still and quiet as he’d ordered her before he tied a piece of fabric around her mouth. She never saw the whip in his hands, but she felt it. Every stroke burning against the alabaster skin of her back, until she fell unconscious to the ground. Explanations for that event had never come, and years of violence later, she never expected to get one anymore. Now, at sixteen, she knew... her mistake was to be born.</p><p>“Soror Zelda?” the High Priest’s voice makes her look up. Bringing her back to the present, as he pulls from her wrist to force her to take the steps that keep her from the book. She straightens her stance once more, extending her hand over the large and terrifying-looking book. His worn hand grasps tightly around her own, making a harsh fist out of it.</p><p>Zelda sees her blood gathering at the side of her hand, bright red almost shining against her milky white skin. It grows until there’s one drop that scurries away and, deafeningly, splotches against the worn pages. Winds raise creating a circle around her forcing the coven to fight to keep their eyes open. Hounds howl loudly, almost as if they were in their ears, and witches cover them with their hands.</p><p>Then there was a collective gasp. Zelda looks around at the sound, still too mesmerized by the sound of her blood. Flinching at the light that shines over her, she sees as all the coven’s eyes are fixated on the sky. Following their gazes, she notices as slowly but surely the new moon shines full before it turns into an orange hue that reminds her of Hell and makes her feel like home. Smiling, she feels the moonlight warm in the crown of her head, as if kissing her. She turns around, placing the quill over her blood.</p><p>As she carefully drew her name into the book, she sways slightly. It feels as if she was siphoning new energies out of the celestial body and into hers and at the same time as if the book was taking it from her. It’s the oddest of the sensations, she thinks, as if she was nothing but a channel for this energy to pass from the moon to the book.</p><p>The howls raise in volume. Against all odds, mugwort grows in the clearing. Blood-red roses and lavenders blossom without explanation between the white coat of snow. The winds increase in speed, taking the sight of her figure from all those who were scared. Only two Spellmans bearing witnesses of the certainty in which her name was written.</p><p><em>Phiona</em>, it said.</p><p>Her name. Her soul.</p><p>Her own truth.</p><p>With the last trace done, the book closed, the winds stopped, the howling ceased, and the plants seemed to crawl back to the place they were hidden before. The Book of the Beast disappeared into thin air, and for the first time in millennia, Lilith breathed easily as equilibrium was finally met.</p><p>Shaking herself out of her memories, Zelda sees the eyes of her family watching her cautiously. She knows they had seen what she had lived that night. And even if they hadn’t known what was going on in her mind at that point, she feels caught in her lies. So she runs.</p><p>“Zelda!” Hilda’s worried voice is the last thing she hears as she crosses the threshold of the front door.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>No worries, there's only as much running that she can do before she finally has to face it.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0058"><h2>58. Chapter 58</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>Phiona.</em>
</p><p>The six letters seem to glow in a luminescent blood-red hue in her mind’s eye. How blind could’ve she been? Deep down she always knew who she truly was, but chose to ignore it. She chose to be Zelda Spellman, for all who asked and those who didn’t too. All these years, all those tears and fears… The burdening weight of everything she could’ve avoided if she just stopped trying to be Zelda Spellman, and started to be herself.</p><p>But how terrified she was of it. She still is.</p><p>She lets herself fall to her knees and leaves out a painful cry, knowing she’s safe in the emptiness of her cottage.</p><p>Safety, that she feels. Yet, the room is far from empty. The redhead not only feels her energy but her firm embrace as the other Daimon in existence collapses to the ground and engulfs her whole in a warm, soul-fixing embrace. “Lilith,” she whispers as the brunette rocks them together as if she understands exactly what’s going on in Zelda’s mind.</p><p>Although she might be feeling whole now, Lilith has an inkling of what’s going on in Zelda’s mind. Those first days as she struggled with fixing the realm of her creation, the worse part, the most painful and scary part, was to take a hold of herself. To understand and embrace who she truly was.</p><p>Lilith too had transformed to please others. From the naïve first woman to the witch and later to the demoness, only to find out she had never stopped being all of those. All parts of herself were laying insider her, dormant. Waiting for that moment where everything would fall into place. When all the seemingly distinct characteristics of the many personas she’d had to be to protect herself had fallen into place, protective walls blasted, to create this one being she now was. She too had to change.</p><p>It looked silly to her own eyes now, just how terrified she was of grasping any ounce of power before meeting Sabrina Spellman. Before her path had crossed with that of her love. That kid in all her blind naiveness had reminded Lilith of how she used to be. The way Sabrina had stood up for herself and had pushed the right buttons to get to the former demoness's angry and more stubborn side. However, it was Zelda’s love and support that allowed her to see she had by far more potential than being just Lucifer’s sidekick. Sabrina was, after all, more like her Aunt than anyone was ready to accept.</p><p>Lilith understands Zelda, perhaps even better than the ginger understands herself. The first woman knows it’s not a simple process to accept yourself when all you seem to know about you simply fade away. When your facade breaks into a myriad of unfixable pieces as someone else points to you what you were too scared to see. Too fearful of yourself and your own worth to even acknowledge what lied in front of you for you to take.</p><p>Unless there’s someone there who loves you unconditionally and supports you no matter what. She shakes her head and sighs against silky red hair. Lilith understands; yet, that last thought makes her wonder why in Heaven she had hidden for a week in Hell when she could’ve been here… Home…</p><p>Perhaps, had she shown up herself when all her ideas of self were still wracked and she feared to look at the mirror terrified of what she would see there... Perhaps, if she had appeared still visibly broken, all the searching around the world in search of Zelda would’ve been avoidable.</p><p>Well, she didn’t really search for her. She knew Zelda would transport herself to the Mortuary and that, at some point, she was going to show up at her cottage. Lilith was just not afraid of a good wait.</p><p>“You know…” The brunette whispers, and the redhead hums against her neck. “It all makes more sense now, doesn’t it, love?”</p><p>Zelda takes a deep breath and moves back slightly to watch her. Lily’s hands find her face and in mirrored motion, the pads of her thumbs clear away the trail of tears that are marring her love’s cheeks. “I…” the redhead starts with a shuddery breath. “I signed my name away… The one she gave me… I didn’t sign Zelda Phiona Spellman as I told everyone I did. As was expected of me. No,” she shakes her head. “I just… It only said Phiona…”</p><p>“As you should have… One name, yours, given by the Gods. No last name because there’s no need for one. Just like I signed mine. Lilitu… it was all that the first line said,” she whispers. A self-deprecating smile and shrug follow. Then, the first woman sucks her lower lip and pecks swollen ones, tasting a couple of tears as she does. “I was shocked to see, to confirm, really… that it was your name, the one that allowed me to breathe with ease for centuries. I knew, though, deep down I always knew it was you.” Lilith smiles and places a strand of hair behind Zelda’s ear. “You know what it means, don’t you?”</p><p>“I thought I knew what it means, but I was wrong. My name means gift, not from God but the Goddess…” she shakes her head, “I can’t believe I was so blind!” She sighs.</p><p>Lilith searches green eyes for a second until she realizes something, “what about that word I whispered to you when we first met? Do you remember it? Do you know what it means?” She asks, crooking her head in curiosity as she waits. Zelda’s eyes glint with recognition.</p><p>“You mean… Mamihlapinatapai?” The redhead says in wonder, and then a beautiful smile spreads on her face. “You know, that can be translated as looking at each other, hoping either will offer to do something they both desire but are unwilling to do. A look that without words that two people who want to start something share, but neither dare to start …”</p><p>“Yes! Exactly!” Lilith beams at her and laughs wholeheartedly. “I guess now it’s obvious why I said it?”</p><p>Zelda kisses her, softly caressing her lips with her own, but there’s so much she needs to understand. Too much needs to be answered before she can enjoy her love in the way she wants to. She breaks the kiss, and they both part with lowered lids and a silly grin on their faces.</p><p>“I used to feel I blocked its meaning behind some veil, slipping through my fingers and not quite at my reach. Now… it’s clear. Everything is so clear…” the redhead says, searching Lilith’s eyes as her hand finds purchase on her sharp cheek, softly rubbing it as if learning it again.</p><p>“It’s part of your gifts as it is part of mine, dear. You were always so good with languages because behind the veil, you always knew them all,” the brunette explains. “Just as I always had. That’s how I never had issues understanding all those mortals I… never mind…” She waves. “Let’s not dwell in my past now.”</p><p>“Lilith,” Zelda starts. Lilith stops her, placing a finger over her lips. “Truly, we’ll have all the time later for you to prod out of my memories whatever you need from my past, but now…” she says and leaves out a pained sigh.</p><p>“What is it, love?” Zelda asks, worry clenching her stomach tightly at the distressed expression of her love.</p><p>“There’s one thing I need to ask of you,” she grimaces. “I feel that I’m in no position to do so,” Lilith says, lowering her eyes to the floor beneath them. “You can request anything, Lily. Requesting it and being granted of it, are two different things, don’t you know that?” Zelda chuckles.</p><p>Lilith bits her lower lip, raising her eyes to meet the green ones that now shine with a new kind of recognition. She takes a deep breath, “you can’t keep running, dear. Not if you want to save the world. Not if you want to defeat this last terror, and especially not if… please don’t take it as a bribe…” she flinches because she knows there’s no way the next sentence comes out right. “I need you and you need me if you want to find Sabrina and bring her back. You must stay, and we must learn to deal with ourselves shortly. You think you can do that?”</p><p>“I…” The redhead looks beyond shocked, and she knows it. Zelda can see that in the way Lilith’s eyes soften and her touch becomes even more delicate and loving. In the way her icy blue shine with emotions she doesn’t seem afraid to show anymore. “It doesn’t have to be <em>here</em> here, can be at the Academy, the mortuary, heck! We can go to hell if you ask, but you can’t keep running away from me... just like you can’t keep running away from yourself, love.”</p><p>The High Priestess sees a deep understanding in Lilith’s eyes. She knows this woman in front of her has been to Hell and back -quite literally too- even so, she’s here at arm’s reach, showcasing countless feelings for her to see and grab if she wants. And Zelda… Zelda wants to drown in those eyes and sink into the warm embrace of her mate. She wants to belong and wants someone who belongs not to her but with her.</p><p>Her pair, her equal… She wants her Lily back, once and for all.</p><p>“Look, we can keep discussing this until I somehow manage to convince you, or you kill me. Or we could…” Lilith trails blushing fiercely, and that gets all of Zelda’s attention. “We could…. What, dear?” she asks with a husky tone, her eyes now shining with mischief.</p><p>“Try it?” Lilith suggests with a shrug as if it was the most obvious of the things. “Do you trust me?”</p><p>“Some days, I wish I didn’t,” Zelda answers honestly. Lilith laughs wholeheartedly, and the redhead’s heart jumps with joy at the sound of it.</p><p>“Yeah, I’m right there with you on that boat too,” the former demoness winks playfully at her. “Now, the question is, <em>Phiona</em>…” she stops, the name sounding strange in her mouth but still fitting of her love. “Would you take me? With all my flaws, issues, craziness, and whatnot? Knowing there was absolutely nothing I could do to stop myself from not loving you?” Lilith finishes, chewing her lower lip.</p><p>Zelda can completely relate to all the self-doubt that her love must be feeling. The self-loathe she sees shining behind the bluest of the eyes. “I’m not a fan of fate, Lily,” she lets out. “I always tried to convince myself it was stupid to believe there was someone destined for us. It felt to me... cheap... as one of those fairy tales that the mortals love so much.”</p><p>“You know fairy tales are mostly written by witches who want to make some extra cash, right?” She points out.</p><p>“I know. It’s... I always thought we had free will. That it was our… Satan given right…” she chuckles at the idiocy of those words. “I believed that fate would take free will away from the equation. How could you choose freely to love someone who was made for you?” She asks. Lilith sighs, she doesn’t like where this is going.</p><p>Zelda gives her a reassuring smile before she takes a deep breath. “When I was faced with the prophecy, my stomach churned at the idea that not even you, The Lilith, had the right to be free, that you had to complete some absurd steps, and once you did, then everything would fall into place. It was preposterous to my belief, that the fate of something so out of hands as the equilibrium of the realms was to be fixed by you and the one made for you.”</p><p>“Then I realized something… everything around me was changing and I tried… so, so hard to keep things the same and then to remain the same. Until I noticed, you were there, with me, holding my hand and so much more. You, dearest, changed me. Things… changed, including the very core of the believes I lived my entire life with have disappeared into nothingness. Yet, your love for me never wavered, just like my love for you never has. I never doubted your feelings, Lily. But I feared mine… I’ve loved no one before you, and I fell so powerful at your side, so completely powerless when you lacked me.” She takes a deep, shuddery breath and raises her hand to stop her from interrupting her.</p><p>“It petrified me to discover that I lost my free will to you. While you seemed to be so free... When I dwelled on my lack, you, love, beat the one who terrified you for millennia out of his throne not once, but twice. No one had free will under his reign. The only thing we all got was his own claim on the powers we could bestow upon him… right? That was what the book of the beast did, isn’t it?”</p><p>“Yes… It grabbed our magic and allowed him to mold it as it was fit for his needs.” Lilith explains quickly.</p><p>“And even then, you fought back and won. Why did you fight back? Was it just the crown as you led us all to believe?” Zelda wonders. Blue eyes search the floor as Lilith’s hands play with the fabric of Zelda’s blouse.</p><p>“I thought I did it for the crown. I wanted to believe that was my true motivation. Yet, it was you…” she mumbles. “I did it because I couldn’t stand the way I thought you saw me. Like some half-wit who had lost her way, who was bullied and broken until there was nothing left to give…” Lilith gulps, blushing furiously, “except my heart, and I lost that too. It that was yours, love… from the very first moment where our eyes met and our magic collided.”</p><p>“That’s what I thought,” Zelda says, and Lilith’s eyes widen in panic, bracing herself for what’s about to come. “You’ll see, dear. It was a choice. Your choice to fight him. I was just the motive… and that, makes me think that fate isn’t that bad. That perhaps it’s just several paths we get to choose from. Loving you isn’t even one. I can’t fight this feeling… But I can choose the path to take. I could walk away from here and you could do so too… but, alas… why would we be so stupid to let go of the only person who ever felt like home, right?” Zelda finishes and looks at Lilith’s astonished face.</p><p>“Wait.. you mean… you are really… staying?” The brunette wonders, but the redhead huffs.</p><p>“There are a few things I need to understand before I can answer that first question of yours,” Zelda whispers, and the brunette braces herself once more for what’s about to come. “I believe you might hold the answers, is that okay with you?” Lilith nods. “How is it that Sabrina became the unbalancing force?”</p><p>“That one is far easier to understand than you might think,” the brunette smiles. “Sabrina is a Morningstar. When her blood came in contact with the Book, it recognized her. You’ll see, the language I used wasn’t as developed when I created the book. Thus the enchantment of the book was ample enough, that even if she is only half celestial, it allows her to channel every witches’ magic as Lucifer did… and that included ours.” She shrugs.</p><p>“And that tipped the balance… how? Your magic was already bound to his will, and so was mine,” the younger witch frowns in confusion.</p><p>“I’m not quite sure of that myself, love. My thought is that mortal blood wasn’t ever taken into consideration. So, I guess that’s what truly tipped it in her favor. That and the way she wasn’t shy manipulating our magic. I believe we weren’t just feeling the unbalance whenever Sabrina used it, but the pull of our magic into her own.”</p><p>“Right, but if that was it. The balance should’ve been restored when she created her mandragora and then killed it.” Zelda points out and then shakes herself. She stands up and helps Lilith stand up. “I believe neither of us is young enough to keep this position forever, and I reckon I can bring my favorite couch and place it in front of the fireplace in a blink of an eye.”</p><p>They walk out of the room and into the living area; the couch is there in front of the fireplace. The glowing fire appears as Lilith’s eyes fall to the hearth, as they both walk towards the kitchen, moving around in search of coffee.</p><p>“I thought about that, too. I hoped the moment Sabrina killed the mandragora twin, her magic would return to the universe or wherever it goes when witches die, and thus the balance would return. Yet, it wasn’t her magic, but ours being used as it was, to do the will of a different celestial, and with far more strength now since your magic was also bound. At least, that’s what happened when I broke the balance the first time,” Lilith shrugs and grabs her mug, and waits for Zelda to sit before she drops on top of her.</p><p>“So, the first time, you broke it because you gave Lucifer a way to manipulate your magic?” The redhead asks, lowering her steaming mug on the table beside the couch yet not even flinching at the way Lilith sits half curled in her lap.</p><p>“Yup. Now, my theory is that when the mandragora was killed, the unbalance remained because Sabrina still existed, and thus her contract with the book was held. She lost her witch side in favor of her mortal side, but her blood was still half celestial.” Zelda frowns. “What?”</p><p>“You didn’t restore her powers.” The redhead states, squinting at her. The brunette sighs. “No. It was impossible to bring her own magic back to her body. So… I… I suppose I did what you did with Rosalind, and the boy you presented to me. I gave Sabrina part of mine and dropped a glamour over it, so it looked like her own.”</p><p>“Why? Why would you do that?”</p><p>“Why? Because I saw you, love. I saw the way it broke you to know that your niece was a mortal. I recognized it was pure torture that was dropped into your shoulders, all because of me. I thought about the mortal life span. What’s that for a witch? A blink of an eye? How long would’ve taken for you to punish yourself for actions that were not yours? Even knowing there was nothing you could’ve done about it. Wouldn’t you still blame yourself? So, please explain to me, how could I not grant her some of my powers, if it spared you? How could I not if I caused her mortality?”</p><p>For what seems like ages to Lilith, Zelda chews her lower lip, contemplating what has just been openly discussed. “Thank you. Even if you did it for me, or even if it was to free for yourself of your own guilt trip. Thank you.” She caresses her cheeks softly as if trying to understand a bit more of the puzzle that her mate was, “you said you thought that by burning the book…”</p><p>“It would restore the balance, yes. Also, I did it so no one else could lay claim on that what wasn’t made to be claimed. Those who are born or blessed into it should be the only ones allowed to wield magic. No being should have the ability to wield the power of all the magical beings, not when they were deceived for it. Believing they would lose what was rightfully theirs if they didn’t give away their souls. Their magic. Bonding them forever to an eternal limbo. Witches too should be allowed into the afterlife. They live far too long to be let floating eternally in the nether realm or worse, tortured in Hell.” Lilith lets out, unable to stop herself from babbling too much about it.</p><p>Zelda smiles, pecks her cheek, and takes a sip of her tea. A pensive look in her eyes. A comfortable silence falls between them.</p><p>“Lilith?” She asks a while after. “How do you look? I’ve seen you like this since you stumbled upon my life. Yet, I’ve seen how Madam Satan looked when you saved me. Is that how you truly look?”</p><p>“I…” Lilith looks down at her hands, ones that aren’t truly her own, yet she feels far more comfortable in this worn body than she ever had in her never-aging one. Zelda’s hand finds one of hers, linking them together and caressing the freckled skin with her thumb. She raises it to her mouth, leaving a soft kiss on the inner side of the brunette’s wrist. “Don’t fret, love. It was just a question, a curious streak if you wish. If you are comfortable in this skin, then who am I to judge. Just know that I’ve seen you green, and I recognized you behind those skeleton eyes. My heart reached out for yours, and I loved you then, too… So, if you ever feel the need to be freed of this glamor, my love for you won’t dwindle.”</p><p>Lilith takes a deep breath. Soon Zelda has in her lap a girl that doesn’t look a day older than her twenties, dark hair, darker olive skin, and yet, the same blue eyes. The young woman blushes under Zelda’s gaze, and the redhead’s heart skips a beat, recognizing her love underneath the flesh and bone carcass. “This is how I look… awfully young… eternally stuck like this,” she says. The voice sounds younger, fresher, but there’s still that deep hue that’s inherently Lilith. “Yet, if you truly don’t mind, I’ll rather wear her,” she says. In a blink of an eye, she’s back at being a clone of Mary Wardwell.</p><p>“Anyone you are comfortable being… I’m comfortable loving.” Zelda winks at her. “There’s one more question I have… for now,” Zelda continues, and her cigarette makes an appearance. “Shoot,” Lilith says, sitting straighter so she can see her love. A cloud of smoke settles around them.</p><p>“Will you?” Zelda asks then, using the cover of her smoke to brave out her question. Yet, the only thing she manages is confusing the heaven out of the former demoness. “Will I…. What?” Lilith frowns.</p><p>“Take me? In those same conditions, you asked of me?” Zelda counters, caressing her cheek.</p><p>“You mean, with all your flaws, issues, and craziness?” The first witch asks, her eyes twinkling with humor. “Just that, no poor sense of humor, or short temper included?” the redhead rolls her eyes then. “I believe there was a ‘and whatnot’ somewhere in your question, besides, you know what I meant…” she lets out. The first woman knows, because she can read the worries, the self-loath, and all those other things that make Zelda so perfectly capable of understanding even her darker spots.</p><p>Those same worries also fill Lilith’s mind. After all, she had spent millennia keeping any semblance of emotion hidden under her demonic facade. Before she loses her braveness, she rests her forehead on the High Priestess one. </p><p>“I must admit, Phiona, Zelda… <em>Love</em>... whatever name you prefer being called,” she smiles. “I don’t love you. My feelings are way beyond just love, is adoration, veneration and so much more. I, dear… I belong to you. And your fears of fate and free will can go to Heaven, because, I give myself freely to you.” She says, her words caressing rose lips as she speaks. “I take you… all of you… as long as you take me too.”</p><p>“I love, you Lilith,” Zelda whispers, searching her eyes. “I adore you. I cannot see a future without you by my side. I take you, all of you, and despite us being bonded by fate or our creators’ will… I give myself freely to you.” Zelda finishes, biting her lower lip as she feels Lilith’s hand tangling in her hair. Her hand searches for dark tresses and soon, their lips collide in a dance of their own.</p><p>The previously almost forgotten hum underneath their skin’s throbs again, power being passed from one Daimon to the other, flowing between them as they wrote it, it should have been, and it finally was.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0059"><h2>59. Chapter 59</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Oh, Gods! I'm sorry it took me so long! I was struggling with finding time to write.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>If someone ever told Zelda that she would get to kiss THE Lilith before the -then- demoness entered her life, the eldest of the Spellman’s sister would’ve laughed. The Dark Lord had never approached her, as she knew even her sweet little sister of hers had been. Zelda Spellman had learned early in her life that she wasn’t worthy. Not of being a Spellman and even less of being noticed by her God. Thus, any ideas of his right hand not only approaching her but liking her… It was beyond preposterous.</p><p>Yet, here she was now. A little over a year since the fated meeting and so many things had changed. Twice had Lucifer being expelled from his throne. Twice had she changed divinities in the course of a year. Hundreds of kisses -and a lot more than just kisses- were shared between her and THE Lilith. Who turned out to be Her Lily. So, as her lips move in sync with those of the woman in her lap, Zelda Spellman can’t help to be thankful for change. It terrorized her before. It empowered her now.</p><p>As Zelda parted her lips slightly, feeling overwhelmed by a bout of realization and the warm pressure of the body on top of hers, Lilith’s tongue searched for permission that was quickly granted. The kiss deepened, their grasp on each other tightened, and their bodies twitched with need. Feelings that they felt coming not only from themselves but from the other one too. Space, though, was limited and sadly, so was oxygen.</p><p>Breaking their kiss, they rested their foreheads together. Eyes closed as they panted, feeling the extent of their magic now flowing through them together as one, as it should’ve always been. The sizzling energy was surrounding them, engulfing them as a comfortable blanket. It took their breath away. Even if, for the first time in a year, they could finally breathe more deeply as the balance began to sort itself now that they had finally accepted being what the other one was searching. While they welcomed what they forgot, or never knew, they truly were.</p><p>Acceptation of the self was a powerful tool in their hands. Being surrounded by the love of the one who loved them beyond anything was empowering and enlightening.</p><p>When they opened their eyes again, after processing everything that was untangled in that last hour, and that they finally sealed with that last empowering kiss. It was to notice the cracks on the cottage floors and walls. Lilies, roses, mugwort, lavender, belladonna, patchouli, and even a couple of pomegranates with ripe fruits. Flowers and plants of all sizes and colors had bloomed all around them, breaking barriers to bloom.</p><p>The effect reminded Lilith of the garden, and she smiled. Their magic… the magic of creation surrounded them, finally settling within them.</p><p>“If this will happen every time we kiss, we’ll have severe gardening issues,” Lilith jokes. Raising her eyes to search for… youthful green ones? There was a look of shock on her face that Zelda quickly mirrored.</p><p>“What?” Lilith asks a bit self-consciously. Still too focused on this Zelda. She can’t be over twenty and has deep, ebony hair that brings out her eyes even more. “You...” Zelda starts, but she shakes herself because there’s something she wants to know, and she can’t be distracted by what she sees. “I saw you before when I was in the nether realm. When you saved me from the fire of the warlocks and took me to the Abbey. Why did you save me? Why were you there? If you never listened to my prayers before?”</p><p>“I’m not so sure, love. I appeared there by Lucifer’s command, and when I saw you bu-burning,” Lilith struggles with the memory now that she knows the witch was her Zelda. “I felt this rage boiling up and then, this overwhelming need to save you.” </p><p>“Once upon a time, I hated whoever deemed me as worthy of saving from that fire. Now, I know it was you, and it was for us to meet. Thank you,” Zelda whispers caressing the first woman’s face in awe, as she threads her hand through the now long ginger hair not as different of her own. “This you, however, I have never seen. It’s not the one you have shown me earlier.”</p><p>“This me?” Lilith frowns. Still too enthralled on the image in front of her to notice that her own darker hair had gotten of bright sunset-orange and her usually freckled hands had become a light-olive. The wrinkles she came to love became the youthful hand of her immortal self. She raises her hand to touch and bring forth the hair her love is touching so softly and finds its new shade, its first shade. Checking her reflection on green eyes, she shakes her head amusedly. “I believe this was the first version of me. I haven’t seen this me since I left the garden.”</p><p>A soft milky hand traces the new contours of Lilith’s face, that unlike what she expected wasn’t so different from the one her Lily liked to wear. Which made Zelda frown in confusion for a second or two. “It’s… different,” the former redhead says, “yet, it’s just as if you’ve rejuvenated Mary Wardwell’s suit.” She shrugs then, “it’s not quite like you looked before, I suppose.”</p><p>“Well, love… I hate to break it for you, but you don’t look quite like you did before…” Lilith adds, and she is almost unceremoniously thrown out to the side as Zelda rushes to the room to find a full-body mirror.</p><p>“What on Hecate’s name?!” the Spellman daimon shouts as she studies herself. The image in the mirror is hers, but it’s not her at all. Getting rid of her clothes, curious as to what this mirage was, she observes her image with keen eyes. No, the woman in the mirror was not the woman she came to be. Yes, there’s white – a tad too clear to be just milky- skin, there are freckles, her eyes are of the same deep green, and her factions remain the same, but as she hadn’t seen them in centuries. It had been so long since she was this young, she thinks. However, it’s the dark hair that falls right to her lower back, curling slightly at the ends that confuse her utterly.</p><p>Lilith appears behind her not so long after her shout, stealing a glance at her own reflection that was not quite the one she used for millennia before becoming the green Demoness. It takes her a millisecond to notice the state of undress of her love. A mischievous glint in her icy blue eyes and an equally playful smile plaster on her face. “Well, if this is what I can expect whenever you drop me to the floor, then every fall will be totally worth it,” she says, wriggling her eyebrows and getting rid of her own clothes.</p><p>Her now olive skin provides a lot of contrast once she allows her arms to fall around on Zelda’s now youthful, thin hips. Unable to stop herself, Lilith caresses her love’s visible hipbones with the pad of her thumbs as her eyes trail up and down the image in the mirror. They look great together, the first woman thinks as she rests her chin on the former redhead, while her own ginger hair falls on alabaster skin.</p><p>“Quite the colorful duet we make,” Lilith whispers, bringing her love closer. One hand going upwards and Zelda can’t help but stretching her neck to surrender to the kisses and bites that she’s feeling on her skin and seeing happening in the mirror. Zelda can’t avoid keeping her gaze fixed on the mirror as her treacherous body covers itself with red splotches. But what makes her gasp is an olive hand that travels downwards and gets lost between the apex of her thighs.</p><p>That’s the last thing she sees, as Lilith’s other hand turns her head sideways and kisses her hungrily. Her movements never still. Not even when Zelda’s body turns and her long legs curl about Lilith’s hips. With a grunt, the first woman walks the steps separating them from the bed.</p><p>In a blink of an eye, they are a heap. Neither of them one to be the bottom one. They fight for dominance until they exchange a quick, knowing look. Equals… That’s what they’ve always been. They move with a synchronicity that was always there before but now seems even more natural. Fingers make way to where they are needed the most and tongues circle furiously and draw lazy patterns in their core. The build-up is nothing quite as they had experienced before. Now they feel everything more deeply, both their own and the other one. And their ecstasy comes with a prayed gasp of their names. Fireworks shine behind their lids as their bodies tremble out of their own volition.</p><p>Outside, a snowstorm break. Inside, it looks like a perfectly savage garden.</p><p>They accommodate in bed, searching for the other’s face. Wondering if they will have to re-learn each other and noticing that even if they had shared these youthful bodies does not differ from what they already knew. The soft spots, the ticklish ones, the ones who drove them insane with passion… all remain the same. Beyond the youthful carcass they now wear, inside they remain the same combination of frail and resilient souls.</p><p>The next thing they know has them both frowning in confusion. As they are coming out from their post bliss haze, a throat-clearing comes from next to them. Turning towards the sound, Zelda readies to fight whatever or whoever was there. Lilith’s hands also raised but quickly lowered, replaced by another cheerful laugh coming from deep inside her.</p><p>“Bezaliel, old friend,” Lilith says to the angel that has been there for her for millennia. The only one who had dared to keep in touch with her demoness self.</p><p>“Lilitu, Phiona,” he greets them. It’s Lilith who must grasp Zelda’s hands and lower them to stop her from attacking the angel in their room. “We are glad to see things have finally fallen into places. Your mother was considering shoving the two of you in a room with no windows and doors, Phiona. Your father thought you were both stubborn enough that even if you were, you would not understand it, Lilitu,” Bezaliel lets out with an amused smile.</p><p>“Well, they created us in their image. I’m sure they’ll know what we would or wouldn’t do.” Lilith shrugs. The angel laughs, “my bet was on you both having sex many times but failing to understand it,” the celestial adds truthfully. “We both know, Lilitu, that history is always repeating itself and you both had shown a marvelous… drive before.”</p><p>“Oh, Hecate,” Zelda mumbled. Her face was red with embarrassment. One thing was to show herself as the driven woman she portrayed, another thing altogether was knowing that the celestial knew what they were doing. </p><p>“Yes. Your mother is pleased by the outcome too.” He points out, unknowingly adding to Zelda’s blooming unease.</p><p>“Bezaliel…. I understand the creators are happy that I… we finally fixed the mess I once created, but… what are you doing here? I mean, it’s not that I don’t enjoy seeing you, my friend, but we are kinda… getting re-acquainted?”</p><p>“Ah, yes,” he says. To Lilith’s amusement and Zelda’s discomfort, the angel sits on the floor and explains to them how the appearances they were now sporting were the ones they were created with, and how they could now change from the youthful ones to the aged ones with nothing more than wanting to do it because those two were who they were.</p><p>“I don’t understand,” Zelda interrupts him then. “If our aged selves are like we were supposed to be even before, how is it possible that Lilith’s aged body belongs originally to a mortal?” Lilith frowns at this question too.</p><p>“I’m sure you’ve seen mortals throughout your lives who had resembled someone you knew from before. It’s quite similar to the appearances you keep. In your case, Phiona, Aradia and Brigid, sported similar images to yours. In Lilitu’s, they created Mary Wardwell purposely on her image. They said that the image that was thought for you both was so precious that they fell in the need to use it for mortals and witches you wouldn’t meet.”</p><p>“Which once again does not explain Mary Wardwell,” Zelda points out. Bezaliel chuckles, “that happens because they chose Mary Wardwell to be the one who Lilith would kill to take her place. They chose her to be the one who would kill you, Phiona. There was no other way than to create her in the likes of the truest of Lilitu’s forms.”</p><p>They rub their faces tiredly, there are so many questions they need to answer but the most pressing one is the one that leaves Zelda’s mouth right then. “What about equilibrium? I can feel it’s getting better, but it’s not yet perfect,” she asks, changing subjects and finally forgetting all about being a child found naked in her lover’s arms.</p><p>“The prophecy that lies among the pages of the Codex Pronogstica was fulfilled. The one that was given to the mortal children of Baron Samedi. You fulfilled it, too. However, balance can only exist when you both are, and you aren’t quite there… yet. Your realm, Lilitu, is still a dangerous place. Your realm, Phiona, is under the menace of the terror inside Sabrina Spellman, child of the fallen Morningstar. There’s no prophecy, no vision, that I can share with you that will tell you how to walk your paths. You are Daimons, and as such, fate is not part of your path and does not affect your choices.”</p><p>“We aren’t? Then… Why the prophecies?” Lilith wonders. Because if these writings were not a shown of how they wrote their fate, she didn’t know what those were.</p><p>“Prophecies are only pointers as to where things can go. Sometimes, the future is not several paths to choose from, as mortals believe, but just one narrow passage that we all must walk. Sometimes, there is not sideways, just a stroll until they come out on the other end. The latter one was the path you walked, yet, you always had a choice. You could’ve always accepted each other fully at any point of the way, and everything would’ve been far easier. Alas, neither of you is one for the quick way.”</p><p>“Then what? How do we figure out what to do?” The first witch frowns. “How do we fix the mess Blackwood created? How do we find the young Morningstar? And what must we do to save her from her demise in the hands of the void? Of the entire realm's demise on the hands of the void?”</p><p>“You are Daimons, it’s your choice what happens and what does not in your lives. You wield not only the witches’ magic, but that of creation. Or you will wield it fully once you both balance each other fully.” He says and they both pinch the bridge of their noses. Zelda can feel the beginning of a headache forming behind her eyes. Lilith huffs, annoyed.</p><p>“The only useful thing you came to tell us is that we can change freely between this form and this form,” she says, passing from her original look to that of Mary Wardwell in a swift motion. “That we can control the magic of creation if we are balanced. But you don’t know what we ought to do to be balanced, or what we should do about Hell or the Void stuck inside of Sabrina Spellman. Did I catch everything?” Lilith wonders. To their surprise, the angel huffs. “It frustrates me too, Lilitu. You know this. Isn’t it enough that you both can affect the mortal realm when no one else can?”</p><p>“Hmm… you said no one, what about our child?” Lilith asks then since she is the daughter of two Daimons.</p><p>“She will be a powerful being, but even being the child of you both, she is not a Daimon. It will up to you both to keep her… neutral.” Bezaliel chuckles then. “Your creators told me I should say ‘good luck’ if you raised this question. ‘If she is anything like them, then they will understand what they put us through’ they said to be exact.”</p><p>“Wait, so you weren’t joking? The girl, your child is also mine?” Zelda asks, sitting in bed and as she does, she too gets back to her older-looking self. Her worried frown firmly in place. “Right! Trust the shiny winged dude over your mate,” Lilith rolls her eyes.</p><p>“I’ve been telling you that same thing for ages now!” she huffs, more annoyed with the lack of information than anything. But as her anger flares, so does Zelda’s. “Well, excuse me if I don’t believe right away something that looks unnatural for the laws they taught me!” The redhead snaps. As their anger grows, they feel the balance shifting once more.</p><p>“Ladies, you ought to learn to control yourselves. Your anger just caused an earthquake. You are the equilibrium. Every fight, every feeling will move the scale. Now, I must go.” He disappears as the two of them glare at him.</p><p>“Damn it!” Zelda mutters, shaking her head. Out of the blue, she laughs. “Gryla knew…” she says and laughs wholeheartedly. Tears falling from the corner of her eyes with her mirth. Lilith looks at her, hoping for an explanation, but she gets none. “Zelda, love… I have no clue what you are laughing at…”</p><p>“It’s just,” she tries to sober up but there are happy tears in her eyes, and laughs seem to erupt from her uncontrollably. The redhead tries to stop herself by huffing, but it only breaks Lilith’s previously serious expression. The brunette might not know what her love is laughing about, but she knows Zelda’s laughs are music to her ears... and so damn contagious.</p><p>It’s amid the laughing fit that green eyes fall into the blue ones, and she sees the face she loved first. Zelda sees the first with such a joyful expression on it. Lines of expression take over Lilith's eyes and the side of her mouth, her nose crinkles adorably so, too, and the redhead thinks she couldn’t be luckier. That’s all it takes her, a sobering up moment to find out once more how deeply she loves this woman beside her. It’s not even a second that goes by before her hand raises to meet dark tresses and pulls Lilith for a heartwarming kiss.</p><p>When they part, they don’t pay attention to the new flowers that decorate the room, but to each other. Eyes searching in awe, still unbelieving that this is their future. That they are one.</p>
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<a name="section0060"><h2>60. Chapter 60</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Oh! I can't remember when I wrote a short chappie for this one.<br/>But it only made sense to cut it where it is ... so, enjoy<br/>Comments as usual (and in any language) are deeply appreciated :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Will you tell me what we were laughing about?” Lilith asked after they broke their last kiss. To the brunette’s surprise, her love giggled at the way she was pouting with puppy eyes on full display. “Stop that and I might,” Zelda grinned. The former demoness rewarded her with another pouty and even more pitiful expression. “Okay, you win!” The redhead shook her head, raising her hands in surrender.</p><p>“You’ll see, when I took our girl to Gryla for safekeeping, she said something I didn’t want to understand,” the redhead says in a whisper. Afraid that if she spoke too loudly, the spell that seemed to have befallen on the room would dissipate and she would find herself alone and Lilith-less once more. Or worse, waking up only to notice it was all a dream.</p><p>It’s the way Lilith pulls her close to her and caresses her hair that makes Zelda accept again that this is her life. That the room is real, that the feelings are there being shared freely between them, and things are definitively happening. “Gryla reminded me it was her right to claim the child if the babe wasn’t related to me. She came close to our girl and then asked me when I had been with child since she didn’t notice it,” Zelda says relaxing against Lilith’s warmth.</p><p>“Ah, I suppose she can see or sense energies? Perhaps she noticed how her magic and yours relate?” Lilith offers, placing a strand of soft velvety hair behind her lover’s ear. Not wanting to point out that Zelda should’ve noticed at the birth or when she did the glamor to the boy’s energy, that her own flavor was in the mix.</p><p>“Perhaps, I don’t know. The moment I saw her, I became so worried about her safety that I never thought about how her energies were also part of me,” the redhead sighs, and props herself on her elbow to see her lover’s face. “Truth is, I wished you were telling me the truth, and I was blinded because I <em>knew</em> it couldn’t be real,” she huffs as tears pool in her eyes. “I could’ve done things differently if my stubbornness hadn’t blinded me,” her voice quivers with every word. Sadness fills the room as it’s passed from Zelda to Lilith, and around them, roses wither.</p><p>“Oh, love. I know,” Lilith whispers, embracing her tightly. “Believe me. I would help you if it were in my hands. I couldn’t figure out a way to make you see what it was so clear to me,” she sighs. “My wild guess is something happened the night you confessed you wanted a child of your own. I know I hoped there was something I could do to stop you from chastising yourself over not having a child. I’m not sure how it worked, love. I guess we will find out, eventually. What I know is that I saw a vision of her green and blue gaze. She looked so lovely, and you… you looked glorious taking care of the child. I was so in awe, that I wanted it to be true too. Then, I just knew it happened.”</p><p>“When you asked that question, I saw her. So clearly, I saw several moments of her life as a premonition of sorts. I guess that did it.” Zelda shrugs, then groans. “I might be in trouble, though.”</p><p>“You? Zelda Phiona Spellman in trouble? Darling, when aren’t you into some sort of trouble?” Lilith wonders. Making the redhead roll her eyes and huff, “I kinda promised Gryla that she will be her night mother.” Zelda groans, already thinking about the earful she would get from Hilda.</p><p>“You, what?! You know your sister is going to kill you for that, right? And then me! That little sister of yours can be quite the scary thing when she means it!” Lilith exclaimed, with widened eyes and sitting on the bed. “I’ve seen it before, she prayed to me for strength!”</p><p>“I didn’t know! It was part of her requests to take our girl and give her back. I promised I would put a good word on her behalf and make it happen if it was in my hands. I guess I ought to honor that.” She adds in a mumbled tone, her face livid.</p><p>Noticing her distress, Lilith tried to send some reassurance on her way, but it wouldn’t do. Words, Zelda needed words, “Love, I’m sure Hilda will understand. Especially, since Gryla took her in and cared for her when none of us could.” Then it was the brunette's turn to blanch, as distress passed from one to the other. “Lily? Love? What’s wrong?” Zelda asked, taking the warm hands in her cold ones.</p><p>“I’m not sure what they… your family… will make out of this. Of us… Of… Of me… Your sister prayed to me for help and strength to kill people, love, and I answered her! How can I hope they will accept me so easily in their lives? In yours!? I guess… I’m… afraid,” Lilith lets out along with a shuddery breath. “I’ve never had a family before, Zelda. What if I’m just a disappointment as your mate? What if they want someone better for you?”</p><p>“Better? Than you?” Zelda scoffed. “There isn’t no one better for me than you, Lily. You know this, we both know this. You, my love, are utterly worthy of getting even more than I can give you.” She smiles, caressing her Lily’s sharp cheekbones softly. “I’m not diminishing my worth, it’s just… there’s so much I’m not sure I can ever give you. Besides, even if I’m not truly related to them, I’ve lived most of my life around them. I know them enough to assure you they want my happiness too, and that absolutely includes you.” Zelda finished placing a soft kiss on her lips.</p><p>Blue eyes eyed her closely as if they were trying to show her something she wasn’t seeing, until her own green eyes widen in realization, “I-I too am terrified of what they will say when they learn I’m not… one of them.” She shudders.</p><p>“It’s not like you had many options, dear. I’m sure they will understand,” Lilith tries, but she knows there’s no way to ease the fear running inside Zelda unless they finally come clean to her family. “I’m willing to bet that Hilda will forgive and forget everything about you not being a true Spellman when she learns you have a child.”</p><p>“Perhaps we both are right, and Hilda won’t hold it against me for having usurped her place all these centuries.” Zelda tries a reassuring smile, but she fails. “Let’s not dwell,” she huffs then, donning her armor of walls. “There are far more pressing matters than if they’ll like me, us, or not. Not when we still have no clue as to Sabrina’s whereabouts, or if in the days or months to come, there will be a world to live in.”</p><p>“Right. But, love… we should still start by telling your family about you and us. All the truth needs to come out. How can we ask for their help if they don’t truly understand the extent of your powers or how you gained them?” She says and points to the room.</p><p>For the duration of their chat, flowers had bloomed and withered, some had burned in a blue fire and some trees grew and disappeared. Everything seemed to change with their mood, including the weather. It rained when sadness took over them, or it alternated between snowstorms and bright sun when they were most happy.</p><p>“Damn it! I hate it when you are right about something I don’t want to do,” Zelda grouses. “Before we tell my family, we should go search that child of ours. It’s time you get to meet her,” she stated, not leaving room for questioning.</p><p>Lilith laughed, “you just want to have her near, to stop Hilda from killing you by giving her someone to coo at.” Zelda blushed at this, but it surprised her to see a shy expression she had rarely seen on her Lily. “I’d like that,” Lilith whispered then, her eyes shining with tears she tries to keep at bay but fails.</p><p>Zelda’s thumb finds her face and cleans away the stubborn tears that marred her face. “What is it? What’s wrong, love?” Zelda asks. It’s not sadness what she feels coming from her love. “I’m just… overwhelmed, I suppose. You ought to understand, I had nothing before. Not without paying dearly for it. Now, I have you and I’ll have our daughter. Perhaps I get to be part of the Spellman’s if they take me, too. I suppose I’m wary of the moment when the other shoe will finally drop.”</p><p>Smiling softly, the redhead brings Lilith so close that they could’ve as well melded. “There’s no other shoe, Lily,” she whispers to her ear, her voice filled with a myriad of emotions. Above them all, there’s a certainty that overwhelms her. “Besides, we still have a thousand things to fix and fight for before we can just be us. Perhaps, I could even help you with this issue with the Realm of your creation? Which I still do not know which one is,” Zelda trails, her curiosity peaking from behind all the feelings they share.</p><p>A sigh and a mirthless chuckle come out of Lilith. “Hell, love… I created Hell. Without Lucifer, and despite my best efforts during the week I spent there, it remains in mild disarray. I left orders, protocols, promises… and armies at ready. Everything I thought it could need to stabilize itself before I came to find you. If Bezaliel words are an omen, it seems it wasn’t enough. It makes sense, demons aren’t so good with accepting changes,” she grimaces. “However, hell can wait, love.”</p><p>The redhead looks at her as if ready to contradict her, but the former demoness just shakes her head. “Since the time when Lucifer took control of it, right after I finished creating Pandemonium. I helped him to divide the land among the demons of a certain age and that became their ranks of the sort. Soon, it became the chaos it’s known for. They don’t like the idea of the unknown, and truthfully, just like what happened with me, chances are that Lucifer’s reign of fear and control is all they remember. So, let them fight for what they don’t own, for the time being, we can easily fix it later on.” She smiled softly.</p><p>“Lily, you aren’t only the Queen of Hell but its creator, you shouldn’t be there, fixing it. You shouldn’t put my silly needs on top of that,” Zelda says, a finger softly tracing her features.</p><p>A shudder takes over Lilith’s body at the combination of the light touch and the way Zelda is looking at her as if she was the most precious being in the whole creation. “It’s more selfish than that, love...” the brunette says, blushing slightly and suckling her lower lip in shyness. “I want to properly meet our daughter. I want to be there for you when you tell them. Perhaps then Ambrose can enlighten us with some marvelous plan of his own. I want to do all of that by your side.”</p><p>“Ambrose?” Zelda frowns in confusion. Lilith just sighs. She stands up and offers her hand to the redhead. “Yes. I think he already knew about us,” the brunette shrugs as she pulls her love up and they walk to the bathroom.</p><p>“Well, he saw us kiss several times,” Zelda points out, and blushes a bit, “and we might have spoken about you, too.” She finishes avoiding her eyes. A finger under her chin and a slight pressure upwards later, and the redhead finds herself treated with a short, loving kiss and the uncontained emotions of the beauty in front of her.</p><p>“I think it’s cute you discussed us with your nephew,” Lilith grins, and Zelda feels under her skin that’s more than a tease. It’s a feeling of belonging and being cherished that overflows her coming from her Lily. “But what I meant was that I think he already figured out who we are for each other. I’m not sure he has figured out you are not a true Spellman since the prophecies never spoke about that so obviously.”</p><p>“Right…” the redhead says, blowing up her hair out of her face before they both step into the bath. They don’t take long, despite wanting it. Zelda knows she had left her home rather abruptly and most likely leaving two worried Spellman’s behind.</p><p>It’s not even an hour later, when after creating some clothes and dressing up in the mortal way that Zelda enjoys, that Lilith grasps her hand. Pecking her cheek, blue eyes meet green and they share more than they thought possible in a gaze. Their lips collide in one swift motion, and a moan leaves the back of their throats as if they had never kissed before and yet, had never stopped doing it. It's addictive, it's them... equilibrium, synchronicity, perfection.</p><p>Around them, everything changes as they appear right outside a cabin in the woods that Lilith has never seen before.</p>
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<a name="section0061"><h2>61. Chapter 61</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>In an eerie-looking forgotten forest, there’s a cottage in the middle of the woods where a witch lives alone with all her children –witches, humans, and, yes, some spirits- and in a cold November dusk, she hears a knock on her door. It’s a magical being, of that she’s certain. One she has never faced before since she can’t recognize the vibrations of the energy coming from it.</p><p>Throwing on herself, her children, and the house, as many protective spells as she can think of. Gryla from the Mountains lowers her spoon and takes the few steps separating her from the front door. Hoping, even if it’s futile, that whoever it’s out there hadn’t come to snatch her proteges. Fear settled in the pit of her stomach, as far as she knew her two proteges were no other than the daughter and son of Lucifer and Lilith, according to the High Priestess who brought her into her home. However, energies were far more telling, and the thousand years she had spent in the living world had made her street-smart too. She knew the High Priestess was somehow involved with the girl, too. If anyone knew where such a creature lived, who wouldn’t try to snatch her?</p><p>There’s no hole to peer at. With a quick plea for help to her new Goddess, she throws the door open. Is surprise what is etched in her face the moment she faces the being on the other side of her threshold. “Hi-High Priestess?” Gryla stutters, frowning in confusion.</p><p>She knows this witch. She had known Zelda Spellman for centuries, almost a year after the moment the Spellman had announced they had added another spawn to their lineage. Yet the redhead’s energy, it’s nothing quite like before.</p><p>“Sister,” the woman at the door gives her a friendly smile. Her pearly white teeth on display. Her green eyes shine in a way the witch hasn’t seen before on the usually bitter Spellman witch, and Gryla finds herself’s distracted by the way a creamy white hand moves away from her face a cascade of fiery amber tresses over her shoulder. If anything, the woman became alluring since the last time she saw her.</p><p>Gryla is beyond confused. She knows this woman since she was a dark-haired child, yet it seems to her she hasn’t ever seen this witch before. There’s a glow coming out of her, a peace that vibrates into her very own center, Zelda’s magic taking over every single available space surrounding her, almost like a caress from a God. Then, as she still struggles to find a coherent thought to let out, Gryla hears a throat-clearing itself. That sound does not belong to Zelda.</p><p>“May we come in?” the redhead asks politely. It’s only then that Gryla sees the second figure standing behind the eldest Spellman sister. It’s just then when she notices the hands that are encircling the haughty woman’s waist. Pale, wrinkled, and freckled hands securely hugging the High Priestess’ barely above the curve of her hips.</p><p>As the blonde frowns in confusion, one head poises itself softly on Zelda’s shoulder. Underneath a dark mane, icy blue eyes shine in that same way she saw moments ago on deep greens. The same peace, the same glow, that same alluring and entrapping wave that sends something utterly divine through her body, that same relaxing vibe taking over as if there weren’t two... Gryla blinks, to try to read their magical signatures as she was so used to. Yet, as she felt before, she sees only one. As if they share the same field that seems never-ending, encasing them both and even mingling with the energies of the surrounding forest.</p><p>“Please?” the dark-haired, blue-eyed woman adds, and that might as well be a spell, yet Gryla can’t tell with certainty. Everything she sees and feels leaves the witch beyond confused, she also feels oddly mesmerized by the duet.</p><p>One magical signature. Two powerful witches.</p><p>How could that possibly work? She wonders, but the blonde notices she won’t know unless she moves out of the way and allows them an entry.</p><p>“Come on in. High Priestess, you know how things go in this abode,” Gryla states. They reward her with a shared knowing-glance and smile between redhead and brunette. Then without a word, the small room is now bigger, and the table is filled with food that smells delicious. She can’t help but notice each of the favorite dishes of her children are arranged in their own little spots. Or that even the withered peony that was in her window’s sill had bloomed again.</p><p>She is so surprised by the change that hadn’t even taken a word of the women in front of her, that she fails to notice how they walk, with their laced hands and so close together that they might as well be glued.</p><p>“Once, I came searching for a favor and in exchange, you asked me to tell you the truth… when I learned of it,” Zelda states as they come to a stop.</p><p>Behind them, the door closes softly, without a prompt. Gryla can’t help but eye at her door while nodding her head as an answer. There are no more words, she only feels the weight of two sets of eyes on her and never one to shy from a staring contest, she brings her eyes to meet them, and she feels herself awkwardly blushing. “Then let me start by introducing you to Lilith,” the redhead says, waving towards the brunette with her free hand.</p><p>“Li-Lilith? The… Lilith?” Gryla asks tentatively. The blue-eyed woman nods, a broad smile taking her features, and the blonde falls to her knees. “Dark Mother, forgive me for not recognizing you.”</p><p>Letting go of Zelda’s hand for the first time since they appeared in that forest, Lilith frowns and helps the woman to stand up. “Rise, child. How would you recognize me, if you have never seen me?” She wonders. “I believe this witch tasked you with taking care of our daughter?” Lilith questions her while looking adoringly at the redhead.</p><p>“Our… daughter?” Gryla wonders. Looking from one woman to the next, not quite understanding what it all meant. “Yes, can we see her?” Zelda asks.</p><p>Nodding once, the hedge witch walks them through the now larger living room and towards the same room Zelda had once visited. There are three bassinets there. Gryla’s own son, and the two babies the High Priestess had tasked her to care for. Brunette and redhead move as one to stand beside the child that has energies like their own. What Gryla sees only creates another layer of doubts inside her mind.</p><p>Lilith leans forward, tracing with a finger the contour of the face she had seen fleetingly only once. The babe doesn’t stir, feeling the safe touch of her mother. Blue eyes raise to search greens. An almost imperceptible reassuring nod later, the brunette softly grabs the baby from her crib, bringing her close to her chest, and allowing herself to breathe her child in. Holding her child for the second time in both their lives. A surge of love fills the space, forcing the blonde witch to take a deep breath, overwhelmed by the feeling, and she won’t dwell on the flowers blossoming between her floorboards.</p><p>“Love,” Zelda whispers, her eyes fixated on the woman holding the child. A loving, awed smile of her own breaking her usual serious demeanor. She reaches over to touch the soft dark hair that is growing on the little head, and then higher to caress the sharp cheek of the brunette. Ice blues find ocean greens, and there’s that same glint of adoration, and awe washing over her as they look at the girl in the former demoness's arms.</p><p>“We did it, love,” Lilith whispers unbelievingly. “We truly created her.” She bites her lower lip, astonished by their power, or by the power of their love since she was feeling a bit corny. “Indeed, we have,” Zelda whispers back. “Thank you,” she mumbles with a breaking voice.</p><p>Gryla can’t move, she can barely breathe properly with all the emotions that run rampant in that room. She feels the tears streaming down her face before she even realizes she's crying, and even after witnessing this, her eyes can’t believe what she’s seeing.</p><p>Zelda Spellman, the untouchable bitch, the most arrogant and detached witch known, is utterly in love and not afraid to display it. The one who had mocked love and all the witches who dared to fall prey to such a silly emotion is now bonded deeply to the Dark Mother of them all. The first witch looks at her with such adoration that it’s almost uncomfortable to watch. And they look at the child in fascination, with tears pooling in both sets of eyes.</p><p>It’s a bit ironic, Gryla thinks, that the most devout of the Spellmans, turned High Priestess of Hecate, had fallen in love with the right hand of their former God. It’s almost poetic justice, that the former demoness loves her back. Two powerful women who had venerated the Dark Lord to unhealthy extremes had set Lucifer aside to search for each other, to love each other, casting him who knew where now.</p><p>As they lose the blonde in her pondering, Zelda steps away from the Dark Mother. Walking with sure steps to the bassinet that contains the other child she had brought to Gryla’s care. “Is only fair for you, boy, to be who you ought to be,” Zelda states in a whisper, touching a chubby cheek. “Love, will you want to say your farewells?” she asks then, looking over her shoulders. The former demoness nods, walking to stand beside the High Priestess. She hands her daughter to Zelda and picks up the other one.</p><p>“Adam,” Lilith coos. “I know you won’t remember me at all, but I was proud to be your mother,” she let out in a teary breath. “I’m sorry I was so close to killing you.” Zelda’s arm makes way to accommodate the former demoness in a sideway hug, as each keeps one baby in their arms. Gryla knows no one would ever believe her if she tried to explain what she was witnessing, not that she understood what was happening herself. “You ought to know that everything I did or didn’t do, was to try to protect you from Lucifer’s hands, boy,” Lilith adds, touching his cheek softly. “You, nor anyone else, need to worry about him any longer. For what it’s worth, I loved every second I had you,” she finishes.</p><p>Zelda’s arm around Lilith, tightens in reassurance, “he won’t remember what you didn’t do, love,” she whispers, “he can’t and you ought to forgive yourself for it, too. He will remember what it felt like being loved by you,” she states, leaning elegantly to peck her cheek without breaking their embrace. The Dark Mother smiles and nods curtly, then she leans to kiss the forehead of the boy as she had done it dozens of times while caring for him.</p><p>There’s a glance between them as if they had an entire silent conversation in the seconds their eyes connected. They switch babies before Gryla sees and feels how the magical energies attached to the boy are siphoned out of him and into Zelda Spellman. The boy cries. “I’m sorry I brought you to our mess, little boy. I thought there was no other way,” the redhead discloses. A touch to his cheek later, and there’s no child in her arms. Yet, both women fail to contain their tears, and despair withers away the flowers on the room. </p><p>It’s Gryla’s gasp for air that makes them turn around as if remembering there was someone else in the room. “The boy was a mortal. He is back where he belongs,” Zelda states as they try to contain their emotions. They breathe in and out, and soon, the room is properly set again. No flowers between floor planks, and no bassinet for the boy who is not there anymore. “Now, there’s a promise I shall fulfill,” the redhead adds, nodding towards the door.</p><p>The blonde walks them back to the table. She notices then there’s also a book now waiting in there. Brunette and redhead sit close together. The child in Lilith’s arm looks up for a second but never wails feeling safe in her mother's comforting embrace. Following Gryla’s gaze, they see the closed tome. Lilith smiles. “We thought it would be easier if it’s written. It will help to explain how things happened.”</p><p>“In the beginning, there were God and Goddess,” Zelda starts, and the book opens. Words appear as if burned on the magical pages... And Gryla from the mountains... well, she falls into a deep slumber, mesmerized by the voice of the two Daimons as they tell the right history as one.</p><p>God and Goddess had existed in completion always, and they will continue to exist forever. Yet, they wanted to experience more, and they created the universe. The universe was empty, there were planets, stars, and vacuum…. And they thought why shouldn’t we create something that lives so we aren’t just us. They created then, Demons and Angels… and things started to fall in shape.</p><p>At the beginning of Earth, everything was chaos. There was no day or night because there was no duality. It just was. Light and darkness communed in a heap, not quite aware of the difference between them. Even so, the creatures that roamed the Earth enjoyed their carnality, while the creatures that roamed the heavens couldn’t. And just like duality didn’t exist, there wasn’t time… yet.</p><p>There was one angel, that jealous of the activities down below, had wanted the same freedom. But neither God nor Goddess would give it to him. “Lucifer, you are the most beautiful of the angels, why will you want to live down there? In such inspiring disarray?” they questioned him.</p><p>“They change, they learn, they experience things we cannot, and through their experiences, you grow.” He had said. Yet, noticing he wasn’t convincing, he schemed, trying to find a way to part them, make one of them see his reason. “At least, create some order? It must be so confusing for the creatures there,” he pleaded, and as God and Goddess saw reason in his claim, they created duality. Yet, it was Metatron, the one tasked to keep it in order. In honor of his idea, they named Lucifer their Morning star. </p><p>“You won’t experience it all if you don’t create someone that’s not like us, neither is like them,” Lucifer growled. “Maybe we should be allowed to procreate with them too,” he added, frustrated. Each of his complaints fell into nothingness. Until it was not just him, but hundreds of angels, asking the same freedom they saw below. “We shouldn’t create more beings,” the Goddess stated, “and we both know, we shouldn’t allow angels to affect that realm when they have so much more of us in them.”</p><p>Alas, She knew Him, and He had always had a soft spot for their creation. She hoped He would listen to Her, or at least talk to Her about it, convince Her to cooperate like They always did. Yet, blinded, He didn’t. In a spot on Earth, He created a special place for the forms He was about to create. Eden, He called it, and it was God-like perfect.</p><p>Eden had a waterfall of the cleanest water that ended up in a lake. Flowers bloomed freely and savagely around it, and trees kept it protected from the brighter rays of the star that warmed the planet. From the finest mud of that beautiful place, He shaped the first woman. He brought her to life thinking of her with the same traits of his Goddess, yet He hadn’t considered Her. Thus, He had created the first woman in his own image.</p><p>And with her first breath, time started.</p><p>He repeated the process with a different version, one on His like, and once He was proud of the experiment, He brought His gift to the Goddess. She was angry. He thought He had made them complete, like Them. But He hadn’t. Her essence was missing. She warned Him that below, things wouldn’t be as He thought, for Her input was not there.</p><p>This confused God at first since everything seemed to work properly. The beings, Lilith and Adam, He called them, lived in peace and quietness. Until She made him noticed it. The first woman went around naming animals and plants, creating with her words. The first man killed everything he touched. “Father,” the first woman had called, “your creation, your Adam, destroys everything I create,” Lilith had said feeling something that wasn't named yet. For she knew nothing of pain and suffering, those words had not been created yet. Not until one day, when the first man took more than they freely allowed him.</p><p>The first woman had called upon the unmentionable name of her father. The one she knew by heart but never had she dared to call. Heartbreak, injuries, violence, despair… Tears… everything painful was created that day. And while God didn’t know what to do, the Goddess allowed the child to get out of there and seek refuge wherever she pleased. Blessing her with the awareness she was lacking. She might not be Her child, but it was His and as such, She loved Lilith wholly.</p><p>Worried about God’s child, She had sent Bezaliel, an angel of their creation, to keep her company. He was to explain to her she was far more powerful than she knew. That she was the one creator inside the Garden. But fear had already marred her beautiful heart. Death and lust settled in as curiosity won over her naivety. She took control of her needs, and she thrived.</p><p>In the skies, Lucifer smiled when he heard Adam’s complaints about his mate having forsaken him, and as God worked on the second woman. Lucifer completed his plans. Knowing the first woman carried the power of creation that was given to her inside the Garden.</p><p>It shocked him to learn she was allowed not only to roam the Earth but free to do as she pleased. Lucifer’s angriness and jealousy grew. That blasted lowly woman who could do things they never allowed him! He sent three angels of his cause to terrorize her. For months, she created children of her own, and he killed a hundred of them by day.</p><p>War came. Angels against angels. Until God and Goddess stopped it. Casting Lucifer and the angels of his cause to the world they wanted to be part of. The cunning angel fell near her. “Who are you?” she had asked. “Lucifer,” he said. Something in the tender way he spoke to her, and the soft way he caressed her skin in the warmth of his hands. In his image, so quite like hers and so different of the demons she had mated with, she thought she fell in love.</p><p>She took him to the place where she loved her demons, and he freed her from the curse he brought upon her. With every passing day, she grew him a realm. A realm of suffering and terror, what he always wanted, what she so harshly learned. Where before she would create plants and animals by her will, creating the first version of them outside the Garden for the demons to watch them in awe. Below, she created nothing but pain and dread. Pandemonium rose.</p><p>God considered annihilation would be the solution, and Goddess rejected His claim. She told Him that when the time came, She would create what was missing. So, Earth grew, and the first woman, the only Daimon, grew alongside her mate. Until it wasn’t enough. For Lucifer wasn’t a Daimon, and he wouldn’t ever be one. His desires were beyond the limits of his own powers.</p><p>And he needed more.</p><p>The descendants of the first man grew in number, and along with them, just as Lilitu had before, some mated with the children of the Daimon, demons, and fallen angels. Along the way, witches were born. The animals and plants she had created sparingly during her days on the desolated Earth had also multiplied and grown. Earth was so different from the desolated scenery she had created for herself and Lucifer in Hell.</p><p>One day, Bezaliel was walking with her on Earth where she belonged, as he told her about witches. The few shreds of her innocence made her fall harder. That day, she created the worst weapon against her. That day, she signed her name and created the book of the Beast. She thought it would help Lucifer create a world like the Earth down on the deathly waste of Hell. To keep him never-ending, immortal. Instead, she gave away her powers of creation, allowing him to wield them even against her. Taking her breath away. Robbing her of her essence if he wanted to.</p><p>Truth was, she learned to enjoy her life as a free prisoner. It was all she knew. As long as she fulfilled his will, everything was quite all right. Lilitu enjoyed her days because she had forgotten all about the peace of the garden. There was a thrill on the wars, pleasure in the carnality, and a weird feeling that coursed over her body every time she felt like she had power. However, with Lucifer wielding her powers and those of the witches who had signed their souls, she also forgot who she was, and started to believe any power she wielded was his.</p><p>They sent Aradia then. To test if there would be a way out of it. She had taught mortals about witches and some feared them and some learned their ways. Mortals created Gods and Goddesses to accommodate their learnings, and as they appeared, they fell. Aradia used those Gods to teach her truth until they killed her for it. Amongst warlocks, the fear of a witch teaching about their ways and empowering mortals grew.</p><p>And as life progressed, Lilith saw hundreds of Gods being born and falling. She also was a witness of warlocks claiming more powers to themselves. Casting the most powerful witches aside... Hedge Witches, they called them.</p><p>Then it happened. In the very old country, a warlock who had no fear of answering the Goddess’ call was born. Even if all they taught him was to follow the steps of the Dark Lord.</p><p>Just like amid Angel's hordes, one of them had started the rebellion. Amid the Churches of Lucifer, they gave Edward Spellman gifts to reach to High Priest. His only mission to take care of the Goddess’ daughter when she came to his family, the rest would accommodate itself. He didn’t know he had also accepted to take on his shoulders a love for a mortal, or how his child would be charged with changing the status quo.</p><p>Edward Spellman thought it was just a silly game, just like the tasks of the Dark Lord, until one day there was a knock on their door and the babe had arrived. He had forced their parents to take her, but since he was more time away learning than at the home, he never learned about the abuses the child suffered. When he did, he thought the Goddess would intervene if it was against Her plans. That granted him his years in the nether realm, stuck watching his own daughter suffer, knowing she was an orphan. Aware that things could’ve been different had he taken care of Zelda, as She tasked him.</p><p>On the darkest night of the year of her sixteen cycles around the sun, the Goddess’s daughter unleashed her full potential as an adult witch… and unknowingly, gave her powers away. The Goddess knew She couldn’t grant the fallen angel with the powers of two Daimons and hope he wouldn’t try to rule over them all. So, as her daughter channeled her powers from the moon and unto the book. She sent the ones of creation to the Earth, bringing flowers and plants all around the clearing. Helping the balance to be restored and allowing her daughter's other half to finally breathe.</p><p>It happened then, that in his eagerness to take over the realm he couldn’t touch as the one of his own (of her own really) that he had sent his short-leashed Daimon to do the work he should’ve done himself. And pieces continued to fall in place.</p><p>In Gryla’s cottage, the Daimons exchanged a smile as their book finally closed; the sun was peering through the window, casting a soft glow over the sleeping witch. Raising from her slumber, the homeowner frowned. “What happened then?” she asked the images of what they told burning in her memory as part of a dream.</p><p>“We fought for our future…” Lilith stated, “but you can read more about it in the book we left behind.” She added, linking her hand with that of the redhead. “It will keep growing as we live.”</p><p>“Life still must happen,” Zelda added, as she accommodated the child in her arms. Gryla frowned in confusion.</p><p>“Am I still welcomed to the coven, High Priestess?” Gryla asked then, a fear growing from deep inside her. The redhead smiled. “I’m sure they will welcome our daughter’s night mother, but, you are the first to learn that I am no longer their High Priestess.”</p><p>“Wh-what? Who?”</p><p>“The rightful owner of that title, of course. It was never my place, even if for years I thought it would be fitting of me.” Zelda smiled. The blonde frown only deepened.</p><p>“Hilda Spellman,” Lilith added. “We’ll come to you for the naming ceremony soon.” With that, the two Daimons disappeared, leaving one confused witch behind.</p><p>“But… she never even explained to me how two witches can have a child….” She trailed and then found the book. “<em>Two Daimons, the true story of Balance.</em>” They called it.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Don't ask me why this one is written like this... All I know is that it refused to be written in any other way.<br/>Hopefully, you still liked it :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0062"><h2>62. Chapter 62</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm not so sure if I like this chapter or not... But I suppose it's still progress, right?</p><p>There are mentions of violence against teen Zelda. :(</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Is another cold, gray, drizzly November day in Greendale. Not unlike the many that occurred through the year in that sleepy little town that knew nothing of the wars fought in its soils, even if the last one happened only days earlier. The sun was barely rising from its slumber, surrounded by dark clouds, its rays scantily shining through them. And it was like this that another day was starting in that little town.</p><p>Around the outskirts of the little town, farmers were already hard at work. Some other members of the community were already raising to get ready for their days. The baker hurried to his post, finding his assistant along the way, to have their first batch of bread ready for those earlier risers that would appear in their fake rush to get somewhere.</p><p>The usual suspects appeared soon after. The librarian, to pick up her mint tea and a scone. Joggers running up and down the main street, waving and greeting every soul that they found on their route. Slowly but surely, the entire downtown would fill with people of all ages, and the town would come to life.</p><p>Today, rarely, one store remained closed.</p><p>At the Spellman Mortuary, its inhabitants stretched in bed. “Hilda?” her dear husband called as she nuzzled his neck in her sleep, “my dear?” he tried again, threading his fingers through the short blonde hair of his witchy wife.</p><p>“Mmm,” she let out in a muffled tone that sent shivers down his torso. Behind his soft voice and usual chirpiness, Doctor Cee was worried. There was a reason they were sleeping in her bedroom at the mortuary and not in their bedroom in his home. A motive behind the closed doors of the Cerberus’ Books that remained liked that for the first time since he had opened the store.</p><p>She had called him, using this soft whispery tone that sent alerts all over his body. There was a sniffle too, and then she added. “Don’t worry, love, things will be okay. Zelda never disappears for long…” and that got him.</p><p>He knew Hilda’s niece had disappeared from their house just eight -no, nine- days earlier. The mortal was aware of the danger that the youngest Spellman was to the world. The explanation Hilda had given him seemed straight out of one book or comic he loved to read. It would work nicely for a series or movie too. They pulled the girl’s soul out from a night terror called “The void” and into a body of her own but from another time frame. Yet, while doing so, they also brought the void inside the girl’s body… His brain had almost exploded with the information.</p><p>His heart had broken with the heart-broken expression of his wife, and the tears that had fallen so freely. Cerberus knew how close that family was, even if they all pretended not to, for the eldest Spellman's sake -most likely. However, he also knew that they all remained in that house because of Zelda Spellman.</p><p>She, with her fake coldness, her practiced haughtiness, and her penchant for drama was the one that kept them together. He figured it out when Hilda was so nervous as if she was going to like him or not. And in the way that Zelda Spellman had gone to extreme lengths to make sure he treated her sister as nothing less than an equal while at the same time making him feel both welcomed and completely out of place.</p><p>Hilda had related to him the stories of how her older sister used to travel around the world and how their home wasn’t the same without her in it. That it always seemed to exist a lack of strength when she was gone, as if there were missing energies to fill her sister’s void. A space Hilda couldn’t fill by herself. She tried, his wife had confessed. To take as much space as she could, she learned to be the bubbly self she portrayed. Hoping that coming the day she lacked, Zelda would miss her too. Hoping that one day, her older sister returned home because she simply missed her.</p><p>Cerberus knew, though, that Zelda had returned by her own will one day, to never leave again. Then, Hilda said, her sister had changed the way she acted around others. He had seen the way the eldest Spellman acted around her family when she thought no one was looking. Doctor Cee had noticed the way her eyes sparkled when they fell over her family. So, it made no sense to him than in an hour of despair, like the one they were facing…. That Zelda Spellman would run away without telling a soul where she was disappearing to.</p><p>So, after Hilda’s unnerved call, Doctor Cee had rushed to the mortuary, closing the store before its usual closing time. He had found his Hildie at the bridge of an anxiety attack. Holding held her close, he helped her to control her breath. All the while, her nephew swung a pendulum over an old-looking map.</p><p>“Nothing,” Ambrose had said disheartened, and Hilda had gasped. “It’s of no use, Auntie. We both know that if she doesn’t want to be found, there’s no way we can find her. It’s only worse than Sabrina also learned that from her.” Hilda had hidden her face in the crook of his neck, dampening, even more, his already soaked shirt.</p><p>Once she was calmed enough, he prepared them some tea, and they sat at the parlor, with Hilda cuddling up to him, and aunt and nephew explained to him what had transpired that afternoon. It was past the witching hour when they had given up.</p><p>“It’s Auntie Zee, Auntie, she will come back, she always does,” Ambrose stated. “Perhaps we should go to bed and by morning, we can try again if she isn’t here already, pretending nothing happened.”</p><p>The blonde nodded, and linking her hand with Doctor Cee, she walked to the room she had taken for herself when they started dating. It wasn’t the first time they shared that room; it wasn’t a weird occurrence, either.</p><p>A ray of the sun filtered through the dark clouds and straight into Cee’s eye. He squirmed in place, closing his eye to the offending light. “Darling, I’m going to make you and your nephew some breakfast,” he whispered, as he shook himself from his memories of the previous day. As an answer, she cuddled closer. “Why? It’s just us here, and Ambrose will still be asleep. There’s no way he went to bed when we did,” she whines.</p><p>He has seen his wife in many, many ways, but whiny Hilda is by far one of the cutest forms of her. Smiling, he places a strand of hair behind her ear and pecks her forehead. “Because I’ve been there when we woke up late and there was no breakfast for your sister at ready. I’ll rather not cause another fight when we don’t know for sure if this one is over.”</p><p>Sitting in bed, Hilda embraces her legs and sighs, “She’s not here, Cee,” it comes out shaky and filled with hundreds of emotions. “Hecate, I just want to know that she’s all right and not mad at me, is that too much to ask?” she mumbles and he doesn’t quite know if that’s a prayer, a plea, or just something she needs to get out of her chest. But she searches for his hand and squeezes it. “Thank you, for being here.”</p><p>“It’s my duty, didn’t you know that? I vowed I would.” He adds with a smile. “Now, I better get myself downstairs. Take your time, darling,” he winks, closing the door on his way out. Hilda presses her hand against her chest and rubs it. It almost seems like she’s missing a piece there, but she knows it’s stupid. Zelda was a grown woman, for Hecate’s sake! So why was she so worried? “Because of all that whole prophecy might entail, perhaps?” she wonders out loud.</p><p>Deciding there’s no point in dwelling, she stands up and goes for a shower. Maybe it would help to clear her muddled brain and wash some stress out of her body. Stripping down and turning the shower on, she allowed the warm water to fall upon her, cleansing her. Allowing her thoughts to run freely, without a need to keep a wall of chirpiness around her.</p><p>Something inside her aches as she once more wonders if Zelda had ever felt this emptiness whenever she escaped the boring little town of Greendale in favor of her own adventures, leaving everyone behind. If she felt anything but freedom when she was not surrounded by her family. Perchance, it was alone when her older sister could finally be who she was without the scorning eyes of their parents on her.</p><p>Did it weigh on Zelda? She wondered. Those scornful glares, those derisive remarks, those hours spent in the garden knowing how cruel the sun was on her skin, and how badly she hated gardening for that. Did her own gaze feel heavy on her older sister? Hilda knew she had looked up at her in awe, hoping her to save her, to help her, even to kill her from time to time, always knowing that she was to be resurrected every time. A tingly feeling of being loved had always appeared with her many last breaths, because behind it all, she knew Zelda would resurrect her. Because -she hoped- Zelda truly couldn’t live without her little sister when losing their older brother had created such havoc in both their lives.</p><p>Shuddering even under the scalding water, she remembered the first years at the academy, and how Zelda harrowed her night in and night out. Yet, even if it scared her, Hilda knew she was safe. However, her sister’s skills to find out alternative ways to terrorize her had always left her baffled and wondering about the things that happened to her when their father woke her up at night and pointed her to get out of the house.</p><p>“The barn needed a cleansing,” the redhead would explain, with a sad smile the next morning if she questioned it. It’s just then that Hilda remembered the thousands of ‘I fell, I tripped, I knocked myself out,’ that left her sister’s mouth in their youth. And the tears -there were so many tears- and the despair that often left her breathless during those early mornings when Zelda returned to bed. Until one day, when she was barely five, Hilda had gathered the courage to find her older sister after her return from the barn.</p><p>“Hildie?” Zelda had gasped as her tiny hand had touched a bloody shoulder. Her back then, ebony hair had fallen free, hiding the bluish and purple marks that marred her face. “Zelds?” Hilda had tremulously asked, “wh-what happened?” she could feel the anguish and pain coming from her older sister, and wondered why her mommy or her daddy weren’t tending to her Zee.</p><p>“Nothing, Hildie. I wasn’t paying attention, and I fell. Hit one feeder on my way down,” she gave her a faint smile, and from somewhere, she had collected the strength to caress her little sister’s cheek softly. “Go back to bed, love.”</p><p>“But Zelds… I…” Hilda trailed, looking at her sister, doubting her next words. “I know you are in pain, let me help?” Zelda eyed at her sister with broken eyes filled with unshed tears. “There’s nothing you can do, Hildie. Go back to bed.”</p><p>“I.. I’m an emphy… empall…” Hilda let out in a tiny broken whisper. Zelda frowned, not quite understanding what her little sister wanted to say until it dawned on her. “An... Empath?” She questioned, her voice quivering with worry. “You feel what I’m feeling?” the older sister asked again to see if that was what her sister meant.</p><p>“Y-yes?” The blonde answered dubiously, and in a swift motion, Zelda hugged her tightly. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so, sorry.” She chanted in her sister’s ears, a few of Zelda’s tears dampening Hilda’s nightgown.</p><p>“Is it bad?” Hilda asked once she had let go, fear etched in her tiny face. A teary chuckle was the first answer. Then a hand that still bore burning marks had raised her chin. “Let no one tell you that you are less than perfect, Hilda Spellman. Do you hear me?” Hilda nodded several times. “You are perfect, Hildy. Don’t believe it if anyone tells you differently, not even if that’s I.” She had stated with such certainty that it was that memory the one Hilda used to gather the courage to face Doctor Cee on that Valentine’s day when she learned he had a succubus inside him.</p><p>However, it was just now, centuries after it had happened, that she noticed that was the same day she stopped feeling Zelda’s pain. Even if she continued seeing her bruises, injuries, and all the anguish hidden deep inside green eyes.</p><p>Hilda cried. How stupid could she be that she hadn’t noticed how utterly bullied her sister was? And by their own parents?! How it must have petrified her to the core knowing that the truth of her dark baptism was out there, written in some prophecy that they couldn’t change. That someone could figure it out it was her and maybe come searching for her to try only Hecate knew what? ... And it was all her fault… It was she, the one who pushed it until Zelda had broken in such a way, that unable to control herself, Zelda had shared her memories with them.</p><p>Why had she signed only Phiona? She wondered then. There was no point in overthinking, she decided later, after having cried her eyes out for everything she hadn’t done for her sister. For everything, Zelda must have done to keep her naïve and unknowing of the true terrors that raised them both so differently. Shuddering, she turned the water off.</p><p>After getting dressed, she walked toward the stairs. Her head running a marathon with her thoughts when she felt it. One magical being… yet, she knew it. She had felt it once, albeit faintly. Rushing through the steps, she noticed Ambrose coming out of the kitchen; they exchanged a mirrored frown.</p><p>“It’s the same energy I felt when I found Zee that time… you know? With the astral thing?” She offered. Ambrose frowned. “Can she be nearby but stuck in the astral plane?”</p><p>“I don’t think so, Auntie…” Ambrose let out and they hear Doctor Cee’s steps approaching them from the kitchen. “What’s going on?” He asked, noticing as aunt and nephew raised their hands towards the doors for some reason he didn’t quite understand.</p><p>The energy was closing upon them, strong and breathtaking. When they thought they wouldn’t be able to survive whoever it was at the other side, there was a soft knock on the door. “Dear, can you open the door? But move quickly out of the way in case we need to defend ourselves,” Hilda said to her husband, feeling that was the best course of action.</p><p>The trio moved closer to the entrance. A nod later and they were counting to three. The door swung open and Cerberus threw himself on the floor. Hilda and Ambrose raised their hands to attack if needed, yet stopped frozen at the image in front of them.</p><p>Lilith crooked her head, watching Aunt and nephew, and even the funnily dressed husband who laid sprawled on the floor. She frowned, risking a glance to Zelda and their girl, before looking puzzled -and a bit defeated- by what she was seeing. “I thought you said they would like me,” Lilith added loud enough, and that added to the general confusion.</p><p>And Zelda? Zelda laughed at the weirdness of it all. “Hilda, Ambrose…. Cerberus?” She added the last one a bit flustered by the man who was standing from the floor (wearing one of Hilda’s flowery robes and a Superman’s brief of all the things!) Both he and her sister were supposed to be out of the house, living their little lives above the shop.</p><p>They felt drowned in annoyance as Zelda dealt with the fact that she wouldn’t have to call her sister and wait for her arrival before disclosing all she came to reveal. Her stomach growled, and the babe in her arms wailed as if in response.</p><p>“I think my girls are hungry,” Lilith mumbled, giving the redhead an impish smile. “I told you we should’ve eaten before waking up Gryla.”</p><p>“Lilith?” Hilda frowned, her voice befuddled at the familiarity of the demoness towards her sister and overwhelmed (and ecstatic) about the one magical signature they seemed to be sharing. If what Ambrose had disclosed about the astral plane and soul mates was real, she thought, feeling giddy as she observed the two women at the entrance that had their hands linked and the cute Lil’ bundle of joy in Zelda’s arm... Wait, was that a babe? In Zelda’s arms? That couldn’t be good, not with the redhead’s current track with babies since the last year, she thought.</p><p>“Zelds?” The blonde chuckled nervously, “another babe?” she added in dismay as she considered what could be the only explanation. The younger Spellman sister took a deep breath, and pinched the bridge of her nose, “you got to stop stealing babies, Zee,” the blond finished chastising her sister while nodding them in.</p><p>“I haven’t stolen no baby… well, not this babe,” Zelda grinned as they stepped inside. “You haven’t?” her sister asked before it dawned on her. “It’s your baby girl, Lilith?” the blonde’s eyes shimmering with glee at the knowledge that mother and child were finally rightfully reunited.</p><p>“It’s our girl, yes,” Lilith grinned, walking toward the kitchen as if she had been there a hundred times, and surprising most of them with her familiarity with it all. Zelda followed her at a lazy pace, not rushing even when there was some clattering coming from the kitchen.</p><p>“Li-Lilith? What are you doing?” Hilda asked as the former demoness overhauled her kitchen. “Well, I could magick it all, but we all know food never tastes great like that.” She said as a whisk moved itself in a bowl and eggs cracked on the air over a pan. “So, you just magick the process?’</p><p>“Sure… why not? Besides, they are hungry and I’m too. Nothing good can come of both Zelda Spellman and I being hungry.” She said looking at Zelda with a loving smile, as they locked eyes right above Hilda’s shoulders. “What a truth…” the redhead agreed, sitting in her usual chair. “Should I settle the table?” She offered, getting a nod from Lily.</p><p>A blink later there were cups, mugs, saucers… the entire table had been set without any word or movement from the redhead. “Oh, the coffee smell, godly, love,” Zelda let out as she caught a whiff. “I know, love. That wasn’t my doing,” Lilith smiled, sitting beside her love’s usual spot, and kissing her cheek while the breakfast cooked itself behind them.</p><p>“Can you do that?” It was Cerberus, the first one to break the bubble former High Priestess and former demoness seemed to be in. Hilda shook her head, unable to grasp the many things that were happening at once.  </p><p>“So, I was right?” Ambrose grinned, seating in front of them. Zelda rolled her eyes, “Yes, Ambrose, you were right,” she huffed, half annoyed and half-amused by the way her nephew’s eyes twinkled with happiness she had seen rarely in his eyes. “I knew it!” He pumped his fist in victory.</p><p>Cerberus looked around and smiled, kissing Hilda’s cheeks, yet unable to bring her out of her shocked state. Walking to the coffee machine, he grabbed the jug and served it. “I hope you like it, Zelda, Lilith. I made it,” he said filling his mug and then Hilda’s with the not so long forgotten tea he had made for her.</p><p>A baby bottle appeared out of the blue, floating near the pot that had the milk for the babe. The pot moved from its position at the stove and filled the bottle by itself. Once it was ready, the bottle appeared in Zelda’s hand, who grabbed it and placed it near the tiny mouth of her daughter. “Easy there,” she cooed as the baby wolfed from it. Zelda’s eyes filling with tears of joy and then raising her eyes, she found the icy blues of her Lily, before they shared a loving smile.</p><p>Zelda sipped her coffee with a free hand, while still eyeing the bottle that floated at the right angle. Once she lowered her mug, Lilith’s hand found hers and brought it to her lips to place a kiss against her knuckles.</p><p>A plate with a pancake stack floated over them, landing in the middle of the table. Ambrose and Cerberus dishing them around quickly.</p><p>It was just then, as the people around the table ate as if that happened daily, that Hilda finally pulled herself together, her hands resting on her hips, a deep frown on her face. “Can someone explain what the heaven is going on here?!”</p>
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<a name="section0063"><h2>63. Chapter 63</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>One more!<br/>PS. I'll take name suggestions, I'm not sure I can keep calling her the babe, the baby girl, their daughter, until the end of the time... xD</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Two sets of adult’s eyes fell on Hilda after her outburst, none of the two were the ones she wanted directed at her. To her utter surprise, her always so detached and guarded older sister brought up the hand that was still tangled on her own and kissed the inner side of Lilith’s wrist. Her eyes glimmered with uncovered adoration. The blue eyes of the first woman shone in kind, and a soft smile as she hadn’t seen before spread open as an adorable light shade of pink, tinted Lilith’s cheeks.</p><p>Hilda watched in bewilderment as they exchanged a knowing -albeit amused- glance. They lowered their hands, disentangling them if only to replace them with their mugs that were once more sipped in silence. As if these soft, loving touches weren’t just the strangest of the things coming from them both.   </p><p>“Well? What’s going on? Anyone?” Hilda prodded again, still waiting. Dumbfounded by the loving ways displayed with no other care in the world by the two women. Something her nephew and husband seemed to absorb, accept and plainly ignore like they’d seen that every day of their lives.</p><p>“Breakfast. I believe is what we have called this for as long as… hmm, as long as you been alive, at least, sister. I suppose your birth shall be enough to justify it being called like that, isn’t it?” Zelda answered smartly, a smirk curving her lips while her eyes fell on the babe in her arms and the emptying bottle.</p><p>Ambrose made the mistake of glancing up towards them, only to find Lilith’s mischievous smile. There was no chance he could help the snort that came out of him, even when he tried to keep his laughter at bay. “Hey!” he complained seconds later than Hilda’s hand slapped the back of his head for it. “I wasn’t the smarty-pants one!”</p><p>“No, but you laughed. Besides, she has killed me for less.” His blonde Aunt shrugged and readied herself to question them. Before she could start her game of twenty questions, or that the two women could provide any explanations of their own volition, Doctor Cee’s hand found Hilda’s.</p><p>“Darling, we all know Zelda’s disappearance had you worried sick about her.” He risked a glance towards his sister-in-law, who nodded in agreement before his eyes fell on his wife. “Your sister has returned to us now. We all can see she is more than just all right. Love, it is far too early to be this riled up,” he added quickly as he felt the squinting glare of his sister-in-law.</p><p>His thumb caressed a comforting path on Hilda’s hand and a devastating loving smile appeared on his face along with the puppy eyes he knew would work on his wife. “So, darling, how about we have a nice breakfast? Then they can tell us all you want to know. I promise I won’t leave your side until you get all the answers you want.” His eyes fell just then on the redhead, hoping his last words weren’t too much for her like. After all, his sister-in-law was a powerful witch, and he only a killable mortal.</p><p>Doctor Cee’s keen eyes noticed then how his sister-in-law’s free hand searched for the one free hand of the woman at her side, giving it a squeeze that was returned with ease. The comfortable, yet nervous energy that until then had filled the room was replaced by waves of reassurance that washed over them in that split second that the exchange lasted. As greens and blues settled over the blonde woman with hopeful yet worried looks, even the only mortal in the room felt as if his own body was electrified. As if every single cell in contact with the air was standing at a halt, just waiting for something to happen.</p><p>“Do you agree?” Hilda’s stern glare fell on Zelda. A serious expression that the redhead had seen only once before in her face.</p><p>Zelda remembered the same look centuries earlier when Hilda was nothing but a child. When her little sister had worried about the injuries she had sustained that night and in her eagerness to help had confessed to being an Empath wincing as she disclosed this. Like being one made her a failure, a defect. Zelda’s expression softened in ways only Ambrose and Lilith had seen.</p><p>Soft lips curled upwards, showcasing a line of white teeth in a tender smile. “Of course, sister, all the questions you might have…” Risking a glance towards Lilith as if searching for a blessing to fulfill what she had just agreed to. “We will answer them all,” Lilith finished with a curt nod.</p><p>Another staring contest happened at that moment, as Hilda seized the truth in their words. Once she found herself happy with the way they kept their eyes leveled with hers, and hadn’t squirmed in place, she sat next to her husband. “Very well, then. Where’s my breakfast?”</p><p>Four sighs left the people around the table, and tension left the room. Everyone inside the kitchen felt a relaxing and loving energy that filled the room that only Lilith and Zelda knew where it came from.</p><p>Doctor Cee thought this new feeling reminded him of the first time he had woke up tangled in Hilda’s arms. The same encompassing feeling that everything was right with the world seemed to take over everything without him having a say on it. Cerberus wanted to know what this thing he was feeling was, or where it was coming from. He wasn’t sure his sister-in-law would be too forthcoming by his question.</p><p>“Any news on finding Sabrina?” Zelda placed the now empty baby bottle over the table. Her eyes settling on Lilith, who was eating silently beside her.</p><p>The redhead doubted for a second wondering if she should just conjure a crib to place their daughter, but sensing her discomfort, Lilith looked at her. She took the last bite from her plate and held her arms open. The babe passed from redhead to brunette, making herself comfortable in her mother’s arms before falling asleep again. Green eyes never left the sight of her little family feeling awed by the knowledge that this was her life. Those were her girls to care for and love without restraint.</p><p>“Well?” She asked then, realizing she remained struck by her little family for far too long and there was no answer to her question either, which she surmised couldn’t be good.</p><p>“No,” Ambrose shook his head to stop staring at them. It was bizarre seeing his Aunt Zelda being so unguarded, even if it was just family. Even when he had seen them kiss before, he felt it was almost as weird seeing Lilith -the woman most of them thought Zelda hated- being equally loving to his Auntie. This differed from what he had seen happening before. It was familiar instead of just a passionate or worried goodbye. “We didn’t have any luck finding her like we didn’t have any luck finding you, Auntie Zee.”</p><p>“Hmm.” She chewed her breakfast pensively. “I wonder what you are doing wrong, Ambrose. Sabrina isn’t that good at hiding. She never could quite grasp those concepts.” The redhead frowned as she reached out for Lilith’s hand she closed her eyes as their hands entwined. A surge of energy filled the room, and suddenly, they felt a wind rushing inside the closed kitchen. “It’s no use,” Zelda huffed, and Lilith sighed. “We need to find her somehow, Lily!” They could feel her concern, and not only in her voice.</p><p>It was then that the others noticed the former demoness too had closed her eyes and was slowly opening them. Pinching the bridge of her nose, as she refocused in the kitchen. There was a weird slouch of defeat in her stance. “I know, Zee. We will, we must believe our search was just too rapid to pinpoint her location in the entire world.” The first woman smiled as reassuringly as she could, albeit knowing she’d failed. “Wherever she is, we must reach her on foot, and we should plan properly.”</p><p>“I agree. We should send Ambrose or maybe Prudence. Rosalind will be a nice add-on, it will make things easier.” Lilith understood that having the Walker girl there would be almost like having an extension of Zelda there. It would make keeping them safe from the distance easier for the redhead.</p><p>“Why is that?” Cerberus interrupted them, clearing his throat nervously when two sets of dangerous eyes settled on him.</p><p>“Has Hilda not told you about Sabrina’s latest troubles?” Zelda crooked her head and looked from her brother-in-law to her blushing sister.</p><p>“I-I… yes… but…” he tried.</p><p>A pale hand raised to stop his nonsensical blabbering, but Lilith beat her to the explanation. “Lucifer spawn has a part of The Void inside her. Thus, she has become The Void, herself. We cannot risk scaring her by transporting someone out of the blue near her without exposing this person to the danger of being caught in the Void. Therefore, whoever it goes will need to approach on foot.” Lilith explained in a soft monotone voice that also kept her daughter calmly sleeping in her arms. As she finished, she raised her eyes to meet those of Doctor Cee.</p><p>“We’ll also need to keep their magical essence hidden, to avoid Sabrina feeling them before they can reach her,” Zelda added, taking a sip of her coffee with a pleased hum.</p><p>“Them? Whoever? Are you truly leaving Sabrina’s safe return into someone else’s hands?” Hilda asked in disbelief. “You both are so damn powerful in your own accord, and you want to send someone lesser? I… can’t believe this. She is your niece, Zelda! Sabrina might not be our flesh and blood, but that doesn’t make her less of a family than she already was! You raised her, damn it! Why wouldn’t you put your best effort into getting back someone we all know you love? Who cares if she’s not a real Spellman?”</p><p>Unknowingly, her words were calming to her sister’s troubled mind. The couple exchanged a glance, hoping the same would be true for Zelda herself. “No, Zelds. We ought to do what we need. We should be the ones bringing her back! Even you, Lilith! You too need her, as she’s the rightful heir of Hell’s throne until your girl is old enough to take over it! ”</p><p>“Are you quite done, sister?” Zelda huffed. “Lilith can’t be there. She needs to get back to Hell, Hilda. You can’t go. Someone needs to tend the children who remain, so you must remain too.” She raised her hand once more to stop her sister from interrupting her. “We all know the moment Sabrina spots me, it will be heaven to pay. I love her, but I also know that my presence nearby might trigger a lot of her rage. We don’t want that, right?”</p><p>Looking around, there were several nods around her. “The best course of action is sending someone else. Someone who won’t annoy our niece just by existing, as I would. Besides, with Lilith away figuring her own set of issues in Hell… there’s only one person in this room who can keep whoever it goes connected through telepathy while covering their magical traits. That would be me, for reasons we will explain to you shortly.” Zelda huffed, leaving her family in one stunned silence. “Are you ready, love?” she asked then in a whisper, looking at Lilith.</p><p>“Whenever you are,” Lilith answered simply. “Perhaps we should take this to the parlor?” she offered since everyone seemed to look at them expectantly. As one, they stood up. Waving their hands, they cleared away everything they used.</p><p>“What about that? Can you do that too?” They heard Doctor Cee asking at Hilda. “No, I’m not sure how they could either. It shouldn’t be possible without an incantation and I didn’t hear them saying one.”</p><p>Despite being the first ones to leave the kitchen, Lilith, Zelda, and their daughter were the last ones to join them in the parlor.</p><p>A bassinet appeared near Zelda’s favorite chair as the redhead dropped herself on it. Lilith lowered their babe, making sure the girl remained asleep before she surveyed the room. Cerberus and Hilda took the love seat, Ambrose in the other chair, and well, that left her with few options. Shrugging, she dropped herself on top of Zelda. It didn’t surprise her when chilly hands kept her in place.</p><p>“Well? What’s going on here?” Hilda asked again.</p><p>Unable to find words to begin, Zelda opened and closed her mouth several times. “I told you we should bring the book with us,” Lilith added amusedly.</p><p>“It’s not that and you know it, Lily… It’s…” Zelda sighed, lowering her eyes and hiding her face in the crook of Lilith’s neck.</p><p>“Hey, look at me,” Lilith whispered. Reluctantly, Zelda moved away from her hiding spot and searched for blue eyes. “Love, I’m here. I’ll be here even after this. Didn’t you listen to her before? Why would it be any different for you?”</p><p>“Because...” Zelda huffed. Lilith’s hand caressed her cheek.</p><p>“It might be all in your head, love. Years of being subjected to those nasty words could do that to anyone. But you know her, you know them. I believe it won’t be different for you, darling.”</p><p>“I don’t get it. What could be different for you, Zelds?” Hilda frowned in confusion as she considered the little she knew. The blonde’s eyes fell on the way the two women were sitting, so close together that there was barely space to breathe. But they all knew Lilith was hardly the first woman Zelda had been with... But she was the first one to make the cut and the first one formally brought to the house to have breakfast with them. Zelda wasn’t this carefree around any partner of hers, not even when Hilda had all but pushed Marie to her lap.</p><p>“I know it can’t be this thing that worries you. Yes, you always seemed to hate each other’s guts. Now it’s clear you are in a relationship that we had no clue about. You know we wouldn’t judge you for that! Not when your love looks so pure and I haven’t seen you glowing like this since… forever. Isn’t that right, Cee? Don’t they look perfect together?” She risked a glance at her husband. “Yes, I also agree you both look utterly in love. If that’s what it is, then there’s nothing to be afraid of or ashamed of.”</p><p>“It’s not…” Zelda sighed. “We are together… we’ve been together for a while now…” A joyful clap interrupted her, “so, you were the one I saw naked on her bed?” Hilda's eyes widened the moment she realized how awkward her question was.</p><p>“Indeed, I was,” Lilith smiled, proud of herself. “I should’ve thanked you for telling our Zelds she should take a day off then. We enjoyed it greatly,” she added, amused by Hilda’s vibrant -yet clueless- energy.</p><p>“Aw, shucks, Zelds! I always knew you were meant to find someone perfect for you! Now you have, and you can help her raise her child.”</p><p>“Our child,” they said at once, without a shade of a doubt.</p><p>“See! You are accepting her as your own already!” Hilda added. “How precious!”</p><p>Lilith and Zelda exchanged a glance, “no, Hilda, you don’t understand. Lilith’s daughter is also my daughter.”</p><p>“Yes, of course, as it should be if you two are going to be together while raising her. You did such a magnificent job with Sabrina. I know you will be an amazing mother too, Lilith, or should I say, sister?”</p><p>“Lilith is quite fine,” the former demoness gasped out, feeling overwhelmed now as Hilda Spellman blabbered excitedly about their future together raising their child. With far more detail than neither of them had considered.</p><p>There was one thing she noticed, Zelda was right. Despite first impressions, Hilda had accepted her with little thought. As if there was nothing wrong with them being a couple. There wasn’t, she knew this, but… it didn’t matter. They accepted them with open arms.</p><p>Now, they only had to drop the bomb.</p><p>The first woman didn’t expect it to go in the way it went. But she should’ve. She had seen her love getting redder by the second, and she had felt the anxiousness growing underneath her skin, as Hilda Spellman continued her incessant monologue.</p><p>“I’m not a Spellman,” Zelda said out loud, out of the blue, effectively cutting Hilda’s speech.</p><p>The room suddenly felt small, as all her fears came crashing into her. The fire on the hearth burned strongly, the candles around the room lighted up without prompt. Until blue eyes fell reassuringly on green orbs.</p><p>“Breath, love,” Lilith whispered in her ear, “just a deep inhale, and now, exhale…” she guided her as they slowly controlled the nervous energy coming from them.</p><p>“Wh-what?” Hilda stuttered. Ambrose’s eyes widened as he laughed nervously, shaking his head, thinking he must have heard it wrong. “What did you say, love? I thought you said…” the blonde witch tried.</p><p>“I’m not a Spellman,” Zelda stated loud enough. She heard it over the loud beating of her heart that seemed to have moved to her ears as she let those words out. Hilda’s mouth stopped moving and hung open for the longest time. “Edward forced your parents to adopt me. I’m not...” she sighed… “I’m a lie,” she added with a sad, self-deprecating smile.</p><p>“Stop it! Don’t… I don’t want to hear it! Don’t you dare to say it again!” Hilda covered her ears and stood up outraged. “No. You are lying.”</p><p>She shared memories that weren’t her own but Edward’s, or Marie’s among the people sitting in the parlor. “I wish, for your sake, Hildie, Ambrose…. To say I was lying, that it was a joke. For mine, it only made sense.” Bringing Lilith’s hand to her lips, she placed a kiss on the inner side of her wrist.</p><p>“She created me so Lilith could find her peace. So equilibrium could be reached again,” she continued. “That’s why you see us as perfect, we are one and the same and spectacularly different. We both have been through so much, only to be the perfect pair.”</p><p>“No,” Hilda paced. In a swift movement, Lilith stood up and helped Zelda to her feet. Nodding at the men in the room to follow her out of the parlor, to give some privacy to the sisters. The redhead took the steps close to her si… to Hilda… and embraced her tightly. Outside, rain poured without preamble.</p><p>“I know it hurts, Hildie. I know it must feel like a betrayal. As if I stole everything that was meant to you, and you will be correct. There’s only one thing I can say in my favor,” she whispered straight into Hilda’s ear. “I might not be a Spellman by blood, but you always will be my little sister. I love you, Hilda. For the longest time, you were my everything, and I don’t know what it would’ve been of me if I hadn’t you growing up. I don’t know if I would resist all I did if you weren’t there in need of protection. If I didn’t feel you should enjoy your life being as soft, loving, and naïve as I met you. If you didn’t love me so freely as you always did.”</p><p>She felt it then, the racking sobs coming from her little sister as they clung to each other. Zelda knew lies had always had a way to break people in the most unexpected ways. She waited, tangled in an embrace until Hilda’s cries became nothing more than sniffles before the redhead finally had dared to let her go.</p><p>“I will understand, we both will, if you never want to see me or us again, Hilda. I will plead with you to let us help you find Sabrina. Then, you will have every right in your name to do as you please.”</p><p>“Who do you think I am, Zelda? Huh?” Hilda said, cleaning the trails of her tears with the back of her hand. “Some heartless bitch? Someone who doesn’t understand what family truly means?” she shouted. “No, Zelds… I’m me… You’ve known me my entire life, why would you believe even for a second that blood would matter to me? Blood might not bond us, but you are my sister, the only one I have… and I’m not giving you away. You won’t get rid of me so easily, damn it!”</p><p>Zelda’s legs chose that moment to give up, as the overwhelming feeling of knowing she wouldn’t lose Hilda after all encased her. She fell to her knees with a loud thump and embraced Hilda’s waist, face hidden against the fabric of her dress, dampening it as grateful tears fell. The blonde’s hand touched her hair and caressed it softly before she too kneeled.</p><p>“Why didn’t you tell me before, Zelds? Why did you keep it in for so long?” Hilda asked faintly, searching her eyes for something she didn’t quite understand.</p><p>“I was afraid, Hilda. That everything your father told me would happen if you knew, would happen. It petrified me… just knowing there was a chance you would kick me out of your life, despise me for having taken everything from you. Everything I claimed just by being your older sister and that truly belongs to you. I claimed your name, your house, your status in the coven…”</p><p>“I don’t care for those things, and you know it.” She said, placing a strand of amber tresses behind her ear.</p><p>“But they will be yours, Hilda. I can’t take over the coven anymore, I cannot be the High Priestess.” She smiled softly. She stood up, her knees cracking with the effort before pulling her sister up. “We should let them in,” she mumbled, and the door Hilda hadn’t noticed was closed, opened then.</p><p>“Everything all right, love?” Lilith entered the room as soon as she felt the change in the redhead’s energies. Walking to stand just in Zelda’s personal space, she pecked her nose. Any traces of what had transpired in the room had left the redhead’s face.</p><p>“Yes, love. Everything is perfect.” Zelda smiled.</p><p>“And you, Hilda?” Lilith wondered, keeping Zelda close in a sideway embrace.</p><p>“I will be if you two finally stop trying to give me a heart attack!” She grinned, and they grimaced at once. “There’s more?”</p><p>“I’m not a Spellman,” Zelda stated, standing proudly, “as Lilith is God’s daughter, I’m Hecate’s daughter. I’m a Daimon, Hilda. That’s what Lilith and I both are.”  </p><p>“Daimons,” Lilith agreed with a smile.</p>
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<a name="section0064"><h2>64. Chapter 64</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Huh... it seems I have some kind of kink on putting Young Zelda through the wringer.<br/>That and it also looks like someone up there (or below) has limited me with one chapter a week, coz that's all I manage to write before rl becomes chaos xD </p><p>(HBD to me!)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“A d-daimon? You and your awful jokes, Zelds,” The blonde witch laughed nervously. Her answer fazed neither her sister nor Lilith. “Nah, you can’t be. I’ve known you my entire life,” Hilda dismissed with a wave of her hand.</p><p>Lilith risked a glance towards her love, before letting her go and plopping herself on the armchair that they had previously occupied. “Well, I’ve been one for millennia and wasn’t aware of it until a week ago,” she threw over her shoulder, turning to check her baby girl. “She is one, and so am I. That’s how this babe came to existence.”</p><p>“Wait. What?” Looking from redhead to brunette, Hilda frowned in confusion. “She’s your daughter? Like… you are her mother? Biologically?” Shuffling her weight from one foot to the other, Zelda took a deep breath. Appearing annoyed, but truly she was fighting the blush that was threatening to overtake her features. “Yes. I willed her image and Lilith accepted it. Or that’s at least how we understand she happened. We are not entirely sure ourselves.”</p><p>Taking a deep breath, the younger Spellman dropped herself on the couch she was sharing with Cerberus before, and surprising them all, she just… laughed. Tears fell from her eyes as she did. The blonde woman kept clearing her face with the back of her hands while they looked at her as if she had lost her last marble.</p><p>“Auntie? Are you all right?” Ambrose risked. Hilda’s husband seemed to be at a loss for what to do with her in such a state.</p><p>“Me? Of course! Yes… you should ask that to your Aunt! I bet she’s ecstatic, even if she’s not showing it. A babe, Zelds!” She said, clapping her hands. A wide smile took over her expression. “You have a babe! I though… Well, who cares what I thought!” Hilda jumped to her feet, walking to the bassinet. “May I hold my niece?” The blonde Spellman asked, biting her lower lip and looking at the two mothers of the child as she anxiously waited for an answer.</p><p>A tentative nod came from Lilith, who trusted in Hilda’s hands as blindly as she trusted in Zelda. Then Lilith too had raised her head, searching for the redhead’s approval. A smile blossomed on the eldest Spellman before she nodded. “Oh, Hecate! She’s so gorgeous! What are we naming her?”</p><p>The two mothers winced. “We haven’t had time to go through that yet.”</p><p>Cerberus chuckled, “I’m sorry. I have brothers, I’ve seen them fight with their wives over names. Perhaps you should find a name that represents your shared story?” He shrugged. Zelda was about to snicker at his comment when she took a moment to analyze what he had said.</p><p>“I’m loathed to say it, but that’s actually a brilliant piece of advice.” Zelda let out, still frowning at accepting his advice.</p><p>“Zelith,” Ambrose said out of the blue. “I feel that’s something Sabrina would’ve come up with.” He shrugged, rather pensively. I’m partial to Cosette.”</p><p>Hilda turned towards him with a knowing smile on her face, “like the first girl you liked when you weren’t nothing but a bratty toddler?”</p><p>The mothers of the still-unnamed child shook their heads at once. “I believe we are straying from the subject at hand,” Cerberus said, noticing this. “Excuse my bluntness and my plain dumbness at this part of your lives, but what exactly is a Daimon? I only reached as far as succubus when I had my little experience and I stopped sticking my nose in dark places.”</p><p>Lilith’s dirty mind made her chuckle at this, and Zelda glared at her for a second, already knowing what her Lily must have thought. Using his chance to redeem himself, Ambrose explained quickly that in the mythology he had been reading since he was young, a Daimon was the direct child of a God -or Goddess- that displayed almost the same God-like powers of their creators. “Oh, like a Demi-God?”</p><p>“No. Demi-Gods don’t inherit their creators’ powers,” was Lilith’s intervention as she stood up to allow Zelda to sit again, before lowering herself on her lap. “We aren’t Demi-Goddesses. We are just created in their image, and since they created us both in this realm, we can intervene in it. That’s the reason Lucifer had me under his control. So he could use my skills to get what he wanted.”</p><p>“Lucifer? Your former God?” He wondered again, getting three nods and groan. “He had your souls bound on the book of the beast, right? Hilda said you burned it.”</p><p>“That’s correct. We all own our own souls again. We can use our own powers as we had from the very beginning of our lives until we lost them to the book. When we signed our names, Lucifer could control to what or where our energies were directed. That’s why he seemed all so powerful. He used our own magic against us. No warding spell we could pull up would endure because he had access to the energies of everyone that had signed the book. He just needed to pull the right one to break it.”</p><p>“Except for Marie’s,” Ambrose whispered, understanding why those were the only wards that had remained the day Lucifer presented himself at them Mortuary to claim Sabrina Morningstar’s body. Zelda’s nose scrunched up in distaste, “Baron Samedi’s hadn’t bound his magic to the book.”</p><p>Ambrose nodded, yet Zelda noticed there was more to come from him. Moments later, her nephew proved her right. “There’s one thing I don’t understand. When Sabrina and I went to Hell, you said you couldn’t grant us the powers that Lucifer had bestowed upon us. That his magic was celestial.”</p><p>“It was what I thought at that moment. I didn’t consider it was our magic that made him so strong. I didn’t understand then that as a fallen angel he had no power to interfere in this realm, or Hell. Not without magic coming from someone else. I empowered him and stupidly kept him in power far longer than I should’ve. I would apologize but, I too was blinded by his lies.” Lilith sighed, lowering her eyes to the ground.</p><p>A wave of guilt and anguish filled the room. The babe in Hilda’s arms squirmed, opening her eyes for a moment until Zelda had tightened her embrace on Lilith. Resting her head on Lily’s shoulder, the redhead pecked her cheek and an overwhelming love surrounded them all before she said, “it’s not your fault, love. Everything that was supposed to happen, happened. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be here as we are.”</p><p>“Yeah, well… When you all lost your powers, it was because he redirected them all to someone else. Since Zelda and I were already sharing our magic by then, he couldn’t possibly take all of hers away. That’s why she got sick, if only when Lucifer drained her magic out of her. Mine quickly supplied her with the strength she needed. Our energies were already acting as they should have since her appearance in this realm.”</p><p>“Sharing magic? But you barely saw each other? How’s that possible?” Hilda questioned then. She couldn’t think of a moment in which the two of them were together and not trying to kill each other.</p><p>“The night of the exorcism, Hilda. My magic did something it had never done before,” Zelda smiled at the memory. “It petrified me when I noticed our energies mixed before reaching the energy vortex we’d created to expel Apophis. Since then and until the day I died, I could feel Lilith’s magic in me, and she could feel mine in her. It wasn’t long after the exorcism that we begun to spend more time together, as we tried to understand what was going on between us.” The redhead smiled fondly.</p><p>“Wait, the exorcism? Of Jesse Putnam? You mean that even when having her… you went and married Faustus?!” The outburst made Zelda blush. “What’s wrong with you, Zelds? And with you, Lilith? I can’t believe it, you purposely married Faustus while being in a relationship. Why did you? And why did you let her?”</p><p>“Adam,” Lilith smiled, remembering that time before Zelda got married, and how the announcement of her engagement had spurred Lilith to take what the redhead had offered all along. Her heart fluttered at the memories of the care her love had so freely given to her, even when she hadn’t disclosed who she was. All those days spent being together, sharing sweet kisses and a deeper conversation than she had enjoyed in millennia.</p><p>Noticing the faraway look on her Lily, and the waves of affection that came rolling underneath her skin, Zelda smiled lovingly, before she took it to herself to explain, “Mary Wardwell’s fiancé came to town around that time. I was already with Faustus, and Lilith had Adam. To our utter bliss and their complete ignorance, we also had each other.”</p><p>“Besides, Zelda had a compelling argument on how it was for the best if she married him. I tried to convince her otherwise…” Lilith said, searching for Zelda’s eyes until they locked in a loving glance. “I love her too damn much to cut her wings. She’s her own self, I believe you all know this. I won’t be the one standing in her way if I feel I’m caging her.” Leaning even closer to Zelda, she whispered in her ear, “love, you are free. You know this, don’t you?”</p><p>Instead of answering, Zelda turned her head and kissed her softly on her lips, parting quickly.</p><p>There was a silence in the room, as Zelda’s family took in the words Lilith let out. The former demoness noticed this, squirming awkwardly on Zelda’s lap, trying not to be nervous at whatever the answer to her declaration was going to be.</p><p>There was a sniffle that was not quite what the mother of demons expected. Then it was Hilda, who at some point had lowered the babe into her husband’s arms, who pulled Lilith up into a tight embrace. “That’s the most beautiful thing anyone ever said,” Hilda mumbled in her ear. “Especially after Faustus and the wreckage he left behind with that awful spell.”</p><p>“Oh, Hilda! She deserves so much more, someone far better than me,” Lilith added, a self-deprecating tone tinting her voice. Hilda frowned and took a step back to watch her. “Nonsense, I know my sister and you are nothing but perfect for each other. Hecate, Lilith! You have a child together. In all the years, that was the only thing no one else could give her, and here you are, all three of you.”</p><p>Lilith couldn’t help but blush at it. Sensing how uncomfortable she was, Zelda cleared her throat and made a gesture to Hilda. Her little sister stepped away from Lilith and sat next to her husband. “I have a question,” Cerberus said, noticing the room had grown quiet once more. “I know I’m not one of you, but I’ve been feeling all these… emotions… taking over the place right since you’ve arrived. Is it yours? Are you the ones creating them?”</p><p>The two women shared a look and blushed. Being both so private, it was highly uncomfortable to know even the mortal could feel them. Zelda pinched the bridge of her nose. “Yes… It’s from us. We are learning to control it. We are still learning to be together and share everything we must.”</p><p>“Is it part of what’s needed to reestablish the equilibrium?” Ambrose asked then, remembering the prophecy he had read. The couple nodded. “After Mary Wardwell killed Zelda, and she brought herself to life... Our Zelda finally raised the last block there was for us to gain control of the full extent of our magic, as the prophecy said. Since we were both so stubborn, it took us long before we reached this point where we are still figuring things out.” Lilith shrugged.</p><p>“Wait… Zelds… that book I’ve read. It said the Heir of earth, which I take it’s you, would be burned twice… Zelda Phiona Spellman, you only said mortals tried to burn you only once!” Hilda’s eyes widened at this new revelation.</p><p>“Mortals, yes,” the redhead huffed, wanting nothing more than taking a drag of her cigarette. Instead, a glass with an amber liquid appeared in her hand and she sipped from it, wincing as it burned down her throat before she continued, “not so long ago, you asked me if I would ever tell you what happened that made me return to Greendale, and pretend I wasn’t who I truly am. That I didn’t carry the magic I had. Do you remember what I answered?”</p><p>“Yes, sorta. That the past is long gone, and no matter what, I couldn’t change it… You said you wouldn’t tell me about it unless you didn’t have a choice.” Hilda said.</p><p>“I have a choice, now. I could keep it from you all, but I believe it will help you all to understand me better.” She smiled as Lilith finally seemed to have found her legs after being so abruptly pulled into Hilda’s embrace. The redhead scooted as much as she could to give Lily space to sit. Once they were comfortable enough, with a deep breath, they were all transported to her past.</p><p>Zelda had been walking around a quaint little town. There were no mortals paying attention to her except to try a lewd comment to gain her attention. She ignored them as per usual, as she made her way to the Academy of Dark Arts that hid in their woods.</p><p>The red-haired witch reached the sealed doors. With a roll of her eyes, she lifted the incantation that protected the door from strangers. Zelda was only passing by, searching for a book Edward had mentioned they might keep, and knowing the Director -at least by reputation- she hoped they would grant her access to their library. Making her way through the halls, she found the Director’s office.</p><p>Johannes Blackwood stood in his menacing stance as she stuttered her request to access the library. “And who you might be? And why should I grant you anything?” Faustus’s father sneered at her.</p><p>“Zelda Spellman, your dishonor.” She was too young and naïve then to understand the look filled with disdain the man had given to her.</p><p>“Ah, Faustus’s pet.” He chuckled as he studied her. “I’m no one’s pet.” She had the gall to answer him, her fit of pride letting out more of her power than she should’ve. Johannes squinted at her before he nodded. “Then you are stupid, witch. You witches are nothing but weak without a man to keep you in line. It is you who mortals fear, and you witches have no mind to fix your own messes. Those end up with us running from mortals and their fires.” He grunted. “Go, get yourself to our library. Get your heavenly book, and get out of my sight, Spellman. I don’t know what my son sees in you.”</p><p>He watched her go, and as soon as she disappeared, he summoned his Top Boy. “There’s an outsider in our library. Zelda Spellman. Find out what book she takes with her. Figure out where she’s staying, she can’t be so far away. Then report your findings to me.”</p><p>The Spellman witch had noticed a warlock following her from a distance the moment he stepped out of the academy when all the magic kept inside its wards had faded to the background. When it was just her and him. She kept walking until she was sure there wouldn’t be another warlock on her tail for him to call for help.</p><p>“Show yourself,” she stated, loud and clear, embracing the tome she was taking. “Why are you following me?” Zelda asked then, noticing a warlock that was a lot younger than herself. “I-I… I couldn’t help but noticing you at the academy library and then leaving the building. These woods aren’t safe for women, not even for witches. So, I thought I could walk you home?” He offered, hoping his words were believable.</p><p>The redhead crooked her head, her eyes fixed on the boy in front of her until she decided she could hex him if he attempted anything else. “Very well then, hurry along.”</p><p>“Why don’t you just transport yourself?” He wondered then. “You said so yourself. These woods aren’t quite safe. I have enough issues with mortals who believe my hair is a dead giveaway that I’m a witch. As if it isn’t a rarity among witches, too.” She rolled her eyes.</p><p>“Are you here for long?” The boy inquired then. Zelda frowned at the number of questions he was asking. “No. I just need something from this book, then I’ll be on my way again. They warned me I can only keep it with me for two nights. I find it fair. I don’t like to remain in the same spot long.”</p><p>They reached the cottage she was staying at in a little over an hour. “Do you want to come inside? I can offer you some tea, and biscuits for the effort.” She said. Another thing she was going to regret later on. “Nice dwelling, how you got it?”</p><p>“It belongs to a family member,” she shrugged. “We rarely use the houses we have scattered through the globe, but we share them with the family members that need them. That’s how I came here.” She answered before he could add some more questions.</p><p>Zelda smiled, he seemed like a nice boy, one Hilda for sure would’ve blushed over. But it wasn’t Zelda’s type. Not that she had one, he just seemed too eager to please. Too meek. Thus, it genuinely surprised her when that night, as she read the book by the candlelight, she felt the boy closer to the house.</p><p>Soon, there was a knock on her door. She opened it, ready to chastise him and maybe hex him when she felt it. Panic settled on the pit of her stomach as suddenly she felt her magic being bound. “What did you do?” she asked him in horror. His only answer was a pitiful shrug. “I’m sorry.”</p><p>There wasn’t enough regret in his voice for what she was about to experience. She felt more warlocks closing on them, one pushed her to the ground and unable to fight with her whole magic, they quickly overpowered her. Zelda kicked and screamed. But who would come out in the middle of the night when stories spoke about the witches dancing in the dark with Satan in the woods, in nights just like that one. When there were no moon and stars seemed to have disappeared too.</p><p>The ropes came then, joining her wrists tightly in a knot that burned her skin as she fought with them. Zelda had managed to send mild shocking waves with the magic leftover she had towards the two warlocks that kept her hands as still as they could with all the thrashing she was doing. Two more joined them, grabbing at her legs that were quickly tied too. Another one straddled her.</p><p>Green eyes widened when she saw the dagger being raised by him, and she considered that there were far worse ways of dying. Especially for a witch. In utter horror, she saw as he forcefully lowered the dagger to her midsection. Her pitiful scream covered the piercing sound made as the dagger broke her skin and further inside. Not giving her a chance to breathe, the warlock’s dirty hand had opened the wound further apart until he found what he was searching for.</p><p>She would never forget the cracking sound and the pain she felt the moment he broke her rib and pulled it out of her body. As if that wasn’t enough, he had passed the bloodied bone to the boy who had paled almost to the same tone Zelda had. “I’m sorry,” he muttered once more, but he took out a thread and bound the remnants of her magic. ‘So much for being sorry,’ Zelda thought.</p><p>As if she was nothing but a sack of potatoes, the man who was straddling her before stood up and kicked her healthy side. Then, he knocked her head against the floor planks and placed a spell to keep her alive for a while. Finally, with a grunt, he threw her over his shoulders.</p><p>They walked in silence through the woods. The only things that could be heard were the desperate sounds of the animals and the muttered words of the two warlocks that kept her bound. Once they arrived at a clearing, he dropped her to the floor with brutality.</p><p>They quickly formed a circle around her. The fire rose as Johannes Blackwood took his position. “Wake up,” he said, as he lifted the spell that kept her unconscious. Her eyes widened as she noticed several of the warlocks she had seen monitoring her at the academy that very morning surrounding her in a circle. ‘This can’t be good,’ she thought.</p><p>“Once we learned about the Spellman’s were almost expelled from our coven. Only ordered to find solace in a different one, for they had the Anti Pope’s grace on their side. It’s only fitting that it’s one of you, Spellmans.” Blackwood spat at her. “Lucifer warned us, we, the guardians of the old ways, that one day a red-haired witch would be the start of our downfall. As his whore was a female, he was certain our doom would come from one too. Even if that’s not you, you are far too strong to be left to wander alone, Zelda Spellman. far too curious,” he said pointing to the book she had been reading, “and what a bad omen the color of your hair is… Burn her.”</p><p>Two warlocks stepped closer to her, and even then, she tried to put up a fight. “Gorgeous, and feisty! your sacrifice will surely please our Dark Lord.” One warlock said as he pulled her up. A second one stretched her arms above her head and hung her from the peg that would keep her in place. Taking his chance to feel her up as he did. “It’s a shame that we can’t feast on your body first.”</p><p>Not even for a second the incantations to keep her powerless had fainted. Not even when she could barely keep her head up. “Dark Lord, come to us. Rejoice in the sacrifice we’ve brought to you!” was the last thing she heard as she lost her consciousness.</p><p>Giving them enough time to allow them to gasp for air, Lilith then shared her memories. The way she had appeared in that bright orange clearing only to find an unrecognizable Zelda hanging as she slowly burned. How she had gotten rid of all the warlocks, save for the one who threw the rib to the floor before rushing away. How she had transported her to the Abbey while muttering a healing incantation to allow the witch to survive.</p><p>Hilda was looking a few shades paler once they finished their memories. “Hecate! Faustus’s father? No wonder the son was an asshole.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thanks for the names! They were quite inspiring!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0065"><h2>65. Chapter 65</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I think this chapter was the hardest one to write... I'm not so sure I like it... but it seems we have just one more to go.<br/>fingers crossed so it writes itself quickly!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“We know now that Lucifer indeed knew I was a Daimon, and contrary to my inability to read that prophecy, he could. I can only assume that’s the reason they were so adamant on burning red-haired witches if they displayed more power than usual.”</p><p>“And you always were such a force of nature, Zelds. I guess you being a Daimon explains so much that I’ve never understood before. When I searched the family story for an explanation on why you were so powerful, I couldn’t find anything.”</p><p>“I’m sorry I took your place, Hildie. Once we bring Sabrina back, you’ll get everything that was always yours by birthright.” Zelda stated, not giving space for doubts. “As things stand, we need to focus on finding Sabrina. Lilith needs to return to Hell. But we needed you to learn the truth since you’ll need to take the place that belongs to you, Hilda.”</p><p> “The place that belongs to me?”</p><p>“As the High Priestess of the Order of Hecate, and Directrix of the Academy of Unseen Arts, of course. I cannot take those positions any longer. They should fall to the rightful replacement of the oldest blood of the coven. That’s you, Hilda.”</p><p>“What? Why? I don’t want it! I… No…” Hilda tried to find the words to make Zelda understand it wasn’t what she wanted, but the redhead stood up and walked towards her.</p><p>Her hand raised, finding her sister’s cheek and leaving a soft caress. Then her warm lips placed a kiss on her cheek, as understanding eyes fell on hers. “Then tell me who, Hildie? Sycorax? Pesta? I can bring Gryla. However, it’s only right that it is you, Hilda. It was always your birthright, and I took it from you. Besides, Lilith and I have our hands full trying to keep the balance. Even Cerberus can feel our emotions, and that’s not right. Every time we lose control, the Earth's balance tips.”</p><p>Lilith stood up then, as she sensed Hilda’s reticence and fear. Grabbing the younger witch's hand, she gave it a reassuring squeeze. “Don’t fear the position, Hilda. We’ll be with you every step of the way. It’s not fair for the other witches like yourself if we take upon telling you how you should use your magic when ours is different. We cannot tell you how to live or what rules to abide by, because we aren’t witches.”</p><p>“But you will be around?” She asked, feeling taken aback by the sheer amount of responsibility that was now dropped on her shoulders.</p><p>Zelda laughed. “Oh, sweet Hilda, you’ve been doing it already. You’ve been the High Priestess for those children, and the one they search for when in need. You are the one that’s been teaching them your ways. I was only the stern hand that kept it in control. I’ve known you all your life, Hilda… you are capable of so much more than you give yourself credit for.”</p><p>The blonde witch blushed. Words of support came easily from all the people in the room. She knew it would not be as easy as Zelda wanted her to believe, but she knew every one of them would help her strive for the best.</p><p>A couple of days went by faster than they thought possible, and even if time seemed to slip from them all, at the Spellman Mortuary, a sort of comforting familiarity spell seemed to have fallen upon them all.</p><p>Hilda and Cerberus still lived at the apartment on top of his store, but, after sharing breakfast with her husband, the Spellman witch teleported bright and early to the mortuary. There, she usually found both Daimons sitting at the kitchen table while things around them sorted themselves. While one of them tended their still-unnamed babe.</p><p>To add to the bizarre image of the two women in the kitchen. Zelda would only pull her hair up in a high, messy bun. The brunette would tighten hers in a ponytail, and surprising them all, the two would be devoid of any makeup and in their robes. As if anything they knew from the two women before the last revelation was nothing but a mirage.</p><p>The blonde Spellman couldn’t quite grasp the fact that Zelda and Lilith were a couple. That they were Daimons was far easier to accept. Not that they didn’t look like or behaved like a couple -because they did- it was that she always thought that any relationship between the two of them would end up with one -or both- dead. So, even when she had noticed the sparks flying between her sister and the back then spinster schoolmarm -as Zelda called Lilith in the past-. Hilda hadn’t even tried to mention it to the redhead, for fear that she would end up buried in their pit.</p><p>Ambrose usually would join them when breakfast was completely done, and the rich, bitter smell of coffee reached his attic, dragging him down by the addictive smell of it. They would coo and feed the babe before getting up at once. Then, the older women would head up for a shower and to fix themselves into proper clothes, leaving Hilda with their babe as they disappeared upstairs.</p><p>“You know they don’t just shower, don’t you Auntie?” Ambrose had smirked the first day of this new dance and had received a slap on the back of the head as an answer. “As long as it makes them happy. I haven’t seen your Auntie Zee this relaxed since… well, ever.”</p><p>Then, once they reappeared. The three women and the babe would leave for the Academy, not before instructing Ambrose to meet them ASAP. All of them knew that any free time was going to be spend by devoting themselves to search for Sabrina.</p><p>Inside the Academy walls, they divided tasks between the three of them and the remaining hedge witches. Even if Hilda was to be appointed as the High Priestess, she had asked for some time before Zelda officially stepped out by divulging her truth.</p><p>Not seeing anything wrong with pretending, the couple had agreed. If questions were raised about why the former demoness was teaching classes during those days, they answered with no other comment than ‘because I said so, and she’s willing’ coming out sternly from Zelda.</p><p>Redhead and brunette had issues keeping their hands to themselves, but they managed. However, plants and flowers were seen appearing in any room whenever they were left alone for a while and someone entered it with no further notice. But no one dared to comment or ask where those came from.</p><p>It was on the third day that, feeling not quite useful after yet another failed attempt to locate the youngest of the Spellmans, that Lilith decided Hell needed her. After stating this, Prudence, Sycorax, Pesta, Mother Hubbard, Ambrose, and Hilda remained quietly observing the exchange between redhead and brunette. A few moments later, after the witches finished dividing their daily tasks, Lilith disappeared out of thin air towards hell.</p><p>Zelda fell to her knees as they gave away at their own accord. Air seemed to be taken away from her as she gasped, trying to control her breathing. “Come back, love,” she requested telepathically before black appeared at the edge of her vision.</p><p>In almost the same faint state, Lilith appeared, dropping herself right next to Zelda and fighting for a breath that seemed hard to take. Until their hands touched and everything seemed to fall back into place slowly as if the world had once again shifted to the right position.</p><p>“I don’t understand,” Lilith whispered from her position, laying on the floor right next to Zelda. “We’ve been apart before, why?” She wondered. Zelda took her chance to breathe deeply, before adding, “I felt empty. As if you were completely out of reach. It makes little sense if at all.”</p><p>“Okay, so I stay until we figure out what the Heaven just happened,” Lilith stated sitting on the floor. “Speaking of Heavens…. Bezaliel, come here and explain,” she shouted, hoping that the celestial would answer her call.</p><p>“Lilitu,” he said, appearing right in front of them. Sitting on the armchair they had vacated moments earlier. “Your daughter is lovely,” he said, noticing the child that was sleeping in a bassinet next to the desk of the Academy’s office they were occupying. “But may I ask why are the both of you crumpled all over the floor?” He continued, ignoring the looks of the other people in the room who had never seen him before.</p><p>Lilith growled, “I just tried to go to Hell, and we almost fainted. What the heavens it means?” she asked, eyeing the celestial with anger. Beside her, Zelda finally sat up too. “Without each other?” the celestial questioned, getting a nod for an answer. “You bond is still settling, once you are done, it will allow you to be apart. Until then, if I was you, I wouldn’t go further apart than the same realm, and not as far away either. Being separated will cause a weakness you’ve not experienced before.”</p><p>“And how you suppose I’ll fix Hell if I cannot leave Earth?” Lilith glared. Bezaliel just laughed, “I didn’t say you needed to fix Hell all by yourself, I just pointed it was not in control. Take Phiona with you.”</p><p>“I cannot go! Not now!” Zelda growled. Bezaliel looked from brunette to redhead and frowned, “why is that you cannot go? Or you cannot remain? You both have enough magick to transient the realms. If you are both in Hell, then you still can affect the Earth and if you are both in this realm, then you still can work your magic in Hell. I’ll take that being a place of chaos, Hell is far more difficult to contain from afar. If that’s all, I should return to my realm.”</p><p>“Why can’t you be useful for once?” Lilith huffed. Bezaliel just laughed. “Being useful is not part of the reasons they created me, now… yours… it might. Lovely to see you again Lilitu, Phiona. Hilda Spellman, the Goddess says she’s pleased you will take over the role as High Priestess. She has the utmost confidence you will be possibly even better than the first one.”</p><p>“I resent that,” Zelda huffed as she stood up and helped Lilith to stand too. The celestial just chuckled. “Your mother thought you might. Good luck, daimons.” He said, winking at them before disappearing in the same fashion he had arrived.</p><p>“Celestials! Always so useless…” Lilith rolled her eyes, but as Zelda said nothing, she turned around to watch her. The pensive frown marrying the redhead’s forehead caught the former demoness’s attention. “Love? Everything all right?”</p><p>“Huh?” Zelda shook her head, bringing herself from her thoughts. “It’s just that what we just experienced gave me an idea. You’ll see. We felt empty. A void that differed from what we felt before, correct?” She didn’t wait for the nod before she continued, “we tried searching for Sabrina’s energy, and found nothing. We blamed it on the speed in which we did it, or on how unavailing the spell we used was. However, if I ask you to locate any other being, we’ll manage. Which is odd, isn’t it?”</p><p>There were a couple of open mouths ready to answer, but she never noticed them. “Because we were searching for Sabrina’s energy. Yet, as far as we know, the void could be strong enough to have overtaken most of her energetic markers and thus, leaving us blind where she is. Unless…” She trailed, as she noticed both Lilith and Ambrose’s eyes widen in realization.</p><p>“Unless, what?” Prudence dared to ask since it seemed no other witch in that room was going to.</p><p>“Unless we search for the void, of course!” Ambrose said quickly. “Sabrina is the void, so wherever the void is, so should be her. Auntie Zee, you are damn brilliant!” he said. He was going to rush and peck her cheek as a show of affection. But as he stepped closer, he noticed how his aunt extended her hand towards Lilith.</p><p>The brunette grasped the offered hand and they both quickly closed their eyes, mirrored proud smiles curved their lips. Opening their eyes, they both sighed in relief. “She is amid the Mountains of Madness.” They said at once.</p><p>“Now we only need to find the people who will search for her,” Ambrose said. Hilda clapped her hands excitedly. Grabbing her niece up, she cuddled the babe close. “You’ll meet your cousin Sabrina in no time, babe.”</p><p>“If we have the volunteers at ready, sister. Otherwise, it will take longer,” Zelda said, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Wh-what do you mean, Zelds?” the blonde asked nervously.</p><p>“Well, remember when we mentioned whoever was going needed to approach by foot so we could hide them to avoid their magic being felt?” Nods were coming from the two Spellmans that were at the house that day. “We can only reach the place where she’s at by foot. Sabrina knew this. Perhaps it is why she disappeared in there. It gives her time to find a new place to hide the moment someone is close enough.” Zelda explained.</p><p>“We can send whoever is going as far as a few days of traveling, Hilda. Most likely leave them at the base of the mountain chain. We might need to take them there ourselves and return,” Lilith said the last part glancing at her love who nodded in return. “Find the volunteers to go, try that Rosalind Walker is one of them. In the meantime, we need to get ourselves to Hell, and perhaps fix our issues with separation before it’s too late.” The former demoness concluded, not leaving space for anything else.</p><p>“Hilda? Hell is no place for a babe. Can we leave her in your hands?” Zelda asked. “Yes, of course. Now, go.”</p><p>Grabbing the other’s hand, Lilith and Zelda teleport without uttering a word. In the office, Prudence, Sycorax, Pesta, and Mother Hubbard glanced towards the remaining Spellman’s as if searching for an answer to the pet names, and uncanny magic displayed by the now disappeared beings.</p><p>Hell is beyond chaotic; they reckon as they appear near Pandemonium. What they see is a seething war. The woods are burning. Besides the souls of the suffering, fallen demons also fill the rivers while the flying creatures screech in the sky as everyone seems to fight for their own life.</p><p>Pain, it’s what Zelda feels right in her loins, taking over her entire body as Lilith collapses on her knees next to her. Tears, as she hasn’t seen the former demoness spill in a while, fall freely from her love. She falls to her knees too and embraces her tightly. As one, they screech loud, and everything and everyone seems to be frozen. Not even the bright fires in the woods seem to escape the power that takes control of them.</p><p>Weapons fall to the ground and whoever is wielding them, falls to its knees, hands to their ears to cover them from the sound of utter pain that reaches them. The flying beings fall to the ground as meteorites would, creating a wave of red dust that covers the realm with breath-taking powder that seems to block everyone’s airways at once.</p><p>Rain falls, red at first. As teary cleansing blood, until it’s not red anymore but clear water falling atop them all. A soft humming tone replaces the painful screech, and that fills them all with an unfamiliar peace. The forest stops burning, and as the clear rain falls on top of them, colors appear in the canopy of the trees, quickly replacing the dull grey of Hell’s woods with a colorful rainbow of trees.</p><p>Purples, yellows, indigoes, bloom in the former depressing forest, and flowers are sweeping through the formerly barren ground as if it was their rightful place to bloom inside hell. As demons try to understand what is happening, dark wings sprout from Lilith’s back, as white ones grow from Zelda’s. Balance seems to tremble under their feet, proudly telling them that’s only right for them to claim what was theirs by their own right.</p><p>They fly upwards. Soaring above all creatures of Hell who cower in fear at first, not recognizing the mother of Demons. Unsurprisingly, treacherous ones raise their weapons against them. They quickly deflect them using their wings. White ones cover black, and black wings keep white ones from harm’s way. Until flying creatures are up with them and they recognize her.</p><p>“Is Lilith!” One of them shouts and there’s even more chaos as the ones who hated her try to get rid of her and the ones who always stood by their side try to defeat the ones against them. But it’s not Lilith, but Zelda’s the voice that pierces through their thick skulls with one word. “Stop!” the redhead’s voice reaches them, and it freezes every being in Hell from any other movement that is not breathing and glancing at them.</p><p>“Why are you killing each other?” Zelda continues. “You are all demons. You can have this realm all for yourselves. We can divide it as it was before, or we can divide it justly too. The only request is for you to stop this carnage at once.” She frees them, as they land in the middle of the most gruesome of the battlefields.</p><p>“Why would we take your word? Lilith is nothing but Lucifer’s whore, and you… we don’t even know you.” One that the former demoness recognizes as a Prince of Hell shouts, walking towards them.</p><p>“Because,” Zelda starts, “This is Lilith's realm and you are all using it only because she allowed you to join her here. Most of you exist, if only because she gave birth to your ancestors. As its creator, it is her rightful place to be the Queen of Hell.”</p><p>Poisoned arrows fly towards them from several places at once. Knifes, spears, and swords raise towards them as they charge to kill the winged beings that dare to claim Hell. But it only takes the Daimons a raising of their joined hands to turn the arrows to dust and weapons to flowers. The most dangerous ones end up converted into colorful balloons. They chuckle richly at the imagery that’s displayed around them.</p><p>The once deserted red sand on the battlefield becomes mossy green. Wherever there was a fallen demon, now a tree grows in the oddest of the shapes resembling the body that was consumed. The water nearby also clears and becomes a bright green.</p><p>“We’ll wait for you there,” Zelda says, pointing towards a mountain covered with pink and white flowers and plants where a previously nonexistent castle now sits. “We have a plan in place, but we will listen to any claims of justice.”</p><p>Taking Lilith’s warm hand, they disappear into the castle. Wings fold into themselves as they disappear once more. Hands reach out for the other’s body and they collapse in the newly created bed that takes most of their new room. Clothes are slowly and almost reverently taken from the other. Until they are in nothing but their underwear, and they smile as once again they seem to complete each other so perfectly.</p><p>Zelda’s almost translucent skin remains covered only by a dark lace, while Lilith’s freckled skin seems to shine deliciously around the white lace that keeps her covered. And they surge at the same time. Cold hands scratch a warm back, and warm ones tangle, one in fiery red hair and the other finding purchase on the cold skin of her lower back.</p><p>With precise movements, they free each other’s breasts from their lave prison, both moaning as they meld into each other. Teeth’s finding necks and earlobes, as they move at once in a practiced dance that has them grinding into willing legs. Until they finally search for the longed core. They drive fingers deep and fast, eliciting all sorts of sounds as they find their perfection together. And as their ecstasy takes all over them, with a prayed name leaving their mouths. It’s only gasps, trembling limbs, and limp bodies that remain of the energies from the two Daimons. While outside... everything changes.</p><p>There’s no sad red sky or bloody rivers. They cannot hear the tortured souls clamoring for forgiveness. There’s not even a trace of the wars that were held just before they arrived. All that remains of Hell, as they knew it before, is the name.</p><p>As brunette and redhead find their most comfortable position tangled together after such a powerful spell, in Hell, the first sunset ever claims the skies with a mix of fiery red and dark brown, and soon, there’s a black star-filled sky that has nothing to envy to the one on Earth.</p><p>And unknowingly to them, balance… settles.</p>
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<a name="section0066"><h2>66. Chapter 66</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I just realized I've been writing this for over four months now. Yikes!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Lilith was the fire that unrelenting and uncontrolled changed every surface, not looking at reasons to do it or to stop. A fire that in her love’s embrace was the glowing embers that kept the room warm and cozy during the toughest of the winter’s nights.</p><p>Zelda was the water that could tame it. The contained yet mighty river that could slowly change every surface at her will. That when uncontrolled, bitterly hit the surface until it resembled nothing at all, eroding everything that once was to leave something utterly different. A turmoil of emotions that poured on a storm, that angry and roaring could create the most beautiful of the light shows, but as her love calmed her, it would quietly give space to a light, purifying rain until it stopped. Their joined calmness bringing out the colorful rainbow for everyone to enjoy.</p><p>Lilith was her wind. A turmoil of energy that had no issues blowing amid the strongest of the storms. Tearing down structures from its hinges and softly caressing the skin in a hot summer was a calm, adoring breeze.</p><p>Zelda, her grounding soil, keeping her fierceness stable just by her love. Bringing her in an embrace to the home the first woman had never before met. Keeping everything standing and growing as she nurtured them by the silence of her existence. Ever present, ever-growing.</p><p>They mixed well, one pushing, one grounding, one burning, one drowning, and at the same perfectly capable of understanding what was that the other wanted and needed without a hint of doubt. Together and in love, they were a perfect balance… and that night Hell had seen them act like one.</p><p>It was a couple of hours after their arrival, that, as one, heavy eyelids opened slowly to give way to the darkness of their room. Smiles spread lightly on swollen lips as hands traveled up to caresses cheeks before they reverently placed a kiss on the other’s lips. There was a humming coming from one or both, but it was pleasant so they couldn’t care who had let it out.</p><p>They shifted, their mattress dipping as their weights moved closer, sharing a breath as their foreheads rested together and their eyes locked from under hooded lids. “How are we going to know if they got the volunteers?” Lilith dared to break the silence, knowing that Zelda worried about her niece.</p><p>“A prayer,” she answered as if it was the most obvious of the answers but confusing her love by this. Her icy hand touched the sharp cheek of her love softly, leaving a cool trail until it got lost on free strands that she hid behind Lilith’s ear. Goosebumps rose on the former demoness’s skin at the softness of the touch. “Yes, you might not hear mine and I might not hear yours, but you do hear Hilda’s. When she prays to you, we’ll know.”</p><p>“Aren’t you a clever daimon,” Lilith grinned. “We should see what mess is out there waiting for us now.” She sighed sadly, not really wanting to get out of the cocoon of her lover’s arms. Yet, she untangled herself from the cooler body and sat on the bed, embracing her knees. The mattress shifted again as the redhead followed her, leaving a kiss on her shoulder before resting her chin on top of it. “We are still alive, and together, there’s nothing that can be bad enough to break us now, love.”</p><p>“I don’t know what I’ll do without you,” Lilith whispered, not exactly avoiding Zelda’s eyes but looking to the window that showed a dark sky with shimmering stars.</p><p>“Then let’s not dwell, let’s face this realm and its people. Let’s fix what we can until we are recalled to Earth. Time might be of the essence and we already used a lot while recovering.”</p><p>Zelda stood up first, offering a sure hand to her love before pulling her naked form out of the bed. She walked them to an adjoined bathroom where Lilith giggled as she found the water coming from the pipe was clear and pure… nothing quite the days when she bathed in the blood of the tormented souls of hell. Things were changing or perhaps had already done so, she thought. But spared no extra moment to it, allowing herself to be led to the bath nestled between warm water and her Zelda.</p><p>The redhead didn’t doubt on pulling her close and latching her lips on the delicate skin of her Lily’s neck, as her hand roved through the familiar body, eliciting from it the most pleasant sounds expertly. “I love you, Lily,” was whispered in her ear, and with a panted ‘Zelda’, her body convulsed in ecstasy splashing water out of the bath. Lilith’s body went limp for a moment, as she controlled her racing heart.</p><p>She turned around to return the attention with the same love, but a kiss was all she was allowed. “Time, Lily. Besides, I’ll know you’ll make it up greatly when we have some more of it.” A cheeky wink was all the former demoness needed to be convinced to let it go… for now.</p><p>They dried the other using newly created fluffy towels, and Zelda laughed when she noticed the several bottles of body lotion that appeared close to where she was. Even if they were in a rush, they took their time dressing and creating the things they needed to be who they were.</p><p>The doors of the newly made castle opened, but not a demon or a hellish Prince dared to enter. “Minion?” Lilith said crooking her head when she noticed the one who was always by her side. “Mistress!” he joined them, and he quickly brought near the ones that were always by Lilith’s side.</p><p>The infernal court appeared next, claiming to have rights and status to fulfill the positions that no longer had value. Zelda and Lilith exchanged a knowing glance, but said nothing as they listened to every claim, and to show they were considering everyone’s words, a book wrote itself with each of the words uttered inside that same room.</p><p><em>“Hail Lilith, full of disgrace,”</em> she heard then in Hilda’s soft and warm tone. <em>“Oh, Lilith, if you are my sister’s partner, we ought to find better words to your prayer…”</em> followed, and that made Lilith giggle. Beside her, Zelda frowned. <em>“The volunteers are ready, whenever you are, love.”</em></p><p>“We need to leave,” Lilith stated loudly. With a wave of their joined hands, they cleared the room of any being. The doors of the castle closed. “Hilda just prayed.” The brunette stated. Not that Zelda needed that clarification. There was no other thing that would’ve made her love to shut the demons out.</p><p>A blink of an eye later, and together they stood at the parlor of the Spellman Mortuary. The first thing they both did was walking towards the bassinet where their daughter laid asleep. “Luna?” Zelda whispered and Lilith chuckled. “Isn’t enough that your mother is the deity your former coven associates with the moon? Gia?” Lilith called, in turn, getting a roll of Zelda’s eyes.</p><p>“I suppose we are still discussing baby names?” Hilda offered as she overheard them.</p><p>“Not quite. Just haven’t found the proper one… yet.” Lilith said. “You called?”</p><p>“Yup, before you ask, I thought you’d want a moment of peace with your babe before we begin. The volunteers… Prudence, Ambrose, Agatha, and, yes, our mortal witch, Ros… are waiting for you at the academy. They were trying to figure out….” Hilda stopped herself as she found they were all at the house, “what to take…” she added. “I’ll never get used to this new version of your magic…”</p><p>A wave of a hand later, and the four witches were dressed in warm robes, a satchel hung across their chests. “Hmm,” the daimons exchanged, and a huff later, they waved their hands once more. Her swords hung from Prudence’s back, and Ambrose's wand appeared, fastened by a bracelet underneath his sleeve. “They won’t work for this, but we agree you’d feel better carrying them,” Zelda explained.</p><p>“There’s one last thing,” Lilith said, crooking her head and looking at Agatha with a smile. “What?” the girl asked, feeling self-conscious under her ice-blue stare.</p><p>“Salem,” the former demoness said, “he can help you find her. It will work as an excuse if you need one.” Zelda nodded in agreement. “Yes, best not to tell her I helped the search. Whatever you do, keep yourselves silent unless there’s no other way. We can cover your magical tracks, but once deep in the mountain, we could not have the same quick effect that we would be this any other place.”</p><p>“A no magic’s land?” Ambrose frowned in confusion. The daimons shook their heads. “A void, Ambrose. You might as well be walking straight into the void.” Zelda said, reaching for her nephew and caressing his cheek. Surprising everyone, she pulled him into a tight embrace. “I’m proud of you, Ambrose. So, so proud of the man you’ve become.” She whispered in his ear before she let him go.  </p><p>“Now, it’s the moment for farewell, Hilda…” Lilith said to her and the blonde quickly moved to embrace tightly all four of them. “Get her back, if you can.” She added with tears in her eyes, and without further ado. It was only her and the babe in the parlor again.</p><p>“How?” Prudence asked once they materialized in the middle of a windstorm. “How can you do things like this without uttering a word?” She wondered.</p><p>“We’ll explain when it’s time. Now, you should go.” Zelda took Ros’s hand, and a compass appeared on it. “It will guide you, even if you cannot hear me.” She whispered. “I’ll be in your head, Rosalind. Because I cannot lose your track as I could with them, you know why.” The mortal nodded. “Off you go,” Lilith added, pointing the same direction that the compass did.</p><p>“You think they’ll manage?” Zelda asked as they watched them go. “We can only hope they will. Should we try?” she asked, and the redhead nodded. “Go first, I’ll keep them covered, they are still too far away from her to be felt if we falter.” Lilith placed a chaste kiss on her lips and Zelda felt her leave her side, but the pressing loss that had accompanied them when they had tried to separate before was no stronger than a tug to her heart.</p><p>A breath of relief later, Zelda too had transported herself to her room at the mortuary. “Go,” she said to her Lily before lied comfortably on the bed. Her eyes barely open as she focused on keeping all four witches and Salem covered. “Are you sure, love? If I’m here, I’ll be able to help.”</p><p>“Just let Hilda know she shouldn’t wake me. You’ll know if something is wrong.” Zelda said.</p><p>“Zelds?” Lilith called, and the name made the redhead's lips turn into a smile, but her eyes were now closed. “I love you.”</p><p>“I love you, Lily,” were Zelda’s last words as she fell into a deep concentration. Entering Rosalind’s mind and seeing what the girl was seeing.</p><p>Two weeks after Sabrina disappeared in haste, the four volunteers reached her, and despite Zelda’s voice telling her to stop forcing the situation, Rosalind Walker did what any teenager mortal always did, and she didn’t listen. And Zelda fell herself trapped in the void attached to the girl.</p><p>Lilith appeared in the Spellman’s mortuary with a clatter, the pain of losing part of Zelda too strong to let it go. “Lilith? What’s wrong?” Doctor Cee who had been just making sure Zelda was alive asked noticing the figure in his sister-in-law's room.</p><p>“Help me, get to her.” She panted, and he hurried to her side to do so.</p><p>Without a doubt, Cerberus helped Lilith onto the bed. The former demoness laid close to her love and then she raised her tired eyes to him, “Leave.”</p><p>“Are you sure? Hilda will kill me if something happens to either of you.” He said, his eyes filled with honest concern. “Yes. I need to bring her back, and she won’t like what she must do for that to happen. She’ll need her privacy.”</p><p>“All right. I’ll keep Hilda informed then.” He said, without thinking, he hugged the former demoness tightly. “Please, don’t lose her, or Hilda will kill me, and don’t die, or Zelda will.”</p><p>Lilith felt overwhelmed by the emotions displayed by the human, and her eyes filled with tears for a second. He let her go and disappeared out of the room as if the most awkward exchange in the world hadn’t just happened.</p><p>With a wave of her hand, she locked the door, and then she kissed Zelda’s entirely too cold lips and joined their foreheads. Wherever they were, it was colder than anything she had felt before. She could feel her energies leaving her body and the Earth destabilizing itself by their lack.</p><p>“Lilith.” It was Zelda’s voice. “What are you doing? You shouldn’t be here.” Zelda said, her voice sounding off inside her mind.</p><p>“Neither should you! We need to leave.” There was an urgency in her voice that the redhead didn’t understand. “We need to…. You need to leave, Zelda. You need to leave Rosalind behind.”</p><p>“No. I promised her I would be with her if she came. I can’t leave her.” Lilith shook her head. “Love, you don’t understand, if you don’t exist… neither do I…. and if we both disappear, there will be no Earth to bring Sabrina back. You need to leave her.”</p><p>“There must be another way, Lily.” Zelda pleaded, already knowing the answer and hating herself for it. “There’s not. Just guide me to her, I’ll explain.”</p><p>And so, through Zelda’s mind, Lilith explained to Rosalind how they needed to leave them in there, at least if they hoped to return one day. “I’m sorry,” Zelda said, and Roz smiled at her. “You tried, Ms. Spellman, you really did. This is my fault. Just... If I never return... tell Harvey and my dad that I love them.”</p><p>“We’ll do, thank you, Rosalind,” Lilith said as she felt Zelda severing the link between her and the entrapped mortal. With a gasp, she returned wholly to her own body, and thick warm tears already fell on her neck where Zelda was hiding from her last awful choice.</p><p>“Cry all you must, love. When you are through, we need to get back to the game. We need to retrieve Ambrose and Agatha, and most definitively an alternative plan.” She mumbled against Zelda’s hair.</p><p>“She’s just a child, Lily. They all are nothing but kids. Why has this all fall upon them? Why is it we couldn’t prevent this?” Zelda cried until there were no more tears left. There was nothing Lilith could answer, instead she simply held her.</p><p>With a kiss on her swollen nose, Lilith fixed Zelda’s makeup when she was done. “Are you ready?” She asked, and a nod later they were at the point where the two survivors of the visit had stopped. Without a word, they brought them back to the parlor. </p><p>Sensing they all needed a moment, Lilith squeezed Zelda’s hand when Sabrina’s mortal friends joined them.</p><p>It was baffling even for the two Daimons how things seemed to fall out in place. As they discussed their next movements and almost frozen Nicholas Scratch had appeared carrying Sabrina’s frozen body, and she was carrying Pandora’s box. The one thing, besides Sabrina, that they were truly worried about getting back.</p><p>Then it was just a matter of who would stay behind. “Hildie,” Zelda started, but the angry eyes of Hilda Spellman stopped her. “Don’t you dare to let me out of this one, Zelda Spellman. If something goes utterly wrong, I want to be there to see my niece.” The redhead raised her hand and caressed her cheek.</p><p>“I was going to say, that you shouldn’t sit this one out. Lilith will.” Zelda added sadly. The former demoness nodded. “I learned to love your niece, Hilda. But she’s yours…. You need to be there too, and…” Lilith sighed. “our babe needs at least one mother. In case something goes utterly wrong. Promise me, that you will bring my love back to me, Hilda. Or at least, do everything in your hands to do so.”</p><p>“As long as your love promises the same with mine,” Cerberus stated behind them. Zelda’s eyes twinkled with unshed tears. “Of course, Cerberus. I’ll take good care of my little sister.”</p><p>“Now, Cee…” Lilith grinned. “You need to hold our daughter while I help them travel. You’ll need my magic to teleport all of you as close as we can get you. We’ve run out of time.” As soon as she deposited the babe in the mortal’s hand, everyone appeared changed to warmer robes that would work for the winter winds that they would face.</p><p>“Don’t say...” Zelda warned before Lilith kissed her goodbye. As they parted, winds howled around them. “I love you, Lily.” She mumbled in her ear and with an “and I, you, my Zelds,” Lilith returned to their home.</p><p>And so, on the winter solstice of that year…. Sabrina made the ultimate sacrifice, she allowed them to return all she had sent to the Void -including Caliban who had been stripped of any powers left in him as soon as he reached hell- and they all had lost Sabrina.</p><p>Be Sabrina anyone else, and it would’ve taken weeks until the soil was apt to bury her, the soil of their own cemetery too frozen to allow it. And they all knew they couldn’t just burn her to ashes, placing her vase on their mantle to mourn her just by themselves.</p><p>But Sabrina’s oldest aunt and her partner were no ordinary people. As they returned, Ambrose carrying Sabrina’s body. Lilith had helped the heartbroken family by erasing from the returned whatever memory they could have from what they had witnessed.</p><p>Then, after trying the Spellman’s Cain Pit for Hilda’s sake and not getting Sabrina back. Lilith had joined them to the light soup Cerberus had prepared for them all. They all sat quietly drinking out of the sheer hunger after being in the cold for so long. It was a quiet event, except for the continuous snifflings and the gasps for air as they fought their too raw emotions.</p><p>Out of the weight of her own broken heart, Zelda had enchanted Hilda’s and Ambrose’s cups with a sedative, and grabbing tightly onto Lilith’s hand, they walked to the morgue where Lilith had stood by a broken Zelda as she worked on preparing her niece body that same night.</p><p>When the morning came, both Sabrina Morningstar and Spellman were ready to be buried.</p><p>It was Zelda, the one who delivered the news. The members of the coven and Sabrina’s friends had all come quietly to say goodbye and pay their respects. And with magic, the Daimons opened the places where the two Sabrinas would lie to rest forever.</p><p>Equally black coffins were levitated out of the Chapel of Rest and into the graves. Sand fell on top of them both, loud and painful with the certainty that there was no coming back for either Sabrina.</p><p>Zelda’s emotions were out of control. Unable to take it anymore, Lilith stood in the back watching over them all. Keeping her love grounded so the storm that was brewing wouldn’t fall atop them all. Even then, she too broke along with them all.</p>
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<a name="section0067"><h2>67. Chapter 67</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Well... after four months and archive knows how many words later, here we are... I hope you enjoy the end as much as you enjoyed the journey.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Without Sabrina, the world was a sad, empty place. Not because she had a say in it before, but because two Daimons were mourning her departure as best as they could. Struggling to contain their emotions as they dealt with the gaping wound of their loss.</p><p>Yet, all their struggle wasn’t enough.</p><p>It didn’t matter if it was summer, or winter… storms brewed everywhere with no explanation. News about climate change peaking filled the TVs in thousands of homes. Rash and violent at first, hurricanes took over the coast, flooding cities and creating havoc all around.</p><p>Dormant volcanoes erupted in a show of uncontrolled rage covering everything with smoke, hot lava slowly descending from their peaks promising to burn everything that stood in its way. Sand storms raised, tearing apart the calmness of the desert.</p><p>Not an animal was seen as they hid away from the disasters that were unnaturally occurring all around them. Celestials were sent down in angelic hordes to protect the creation as best as they could.</p><p>Churches of all denominations and cults filled to the brim with their people. They chanted prayers to all Gods and Goddesses and even some infernal beings as they prepared themselves for what they could only describe as the End of the World.</p><p>They were all too late, unaware of how they already had survived the worst of the ways to be gone of existence. Saved from being consumed and forgotten by the inexistence itself, with no Hell, Heaven, Gehenna to look up to. Utterly unaware that the only reason they could stand and pray to anything they believed for was not one of their faith but a barely seventeen-year-old half-mortal child.</p><p>And in the town of Greendale, where it always felt like Halloween, sadness seemed to permeate every surface. Rooted in the hearts of everyone who lived in there. People cried for no reason. Children walked with their heads down prey of anguish they hadn’t known before.</p><p>A faint drizzle that seeped right through the bones fell relentlessly. Not a store was opened that day as their citizens all felt too depressed for no reason at all. Not even a handful of their citizens knew what had transpired the previous night.</p><p>At the Spellman’s Mortuary, witches dragged their feet in a house that fell so utterly big and quiet for the usual loudness of their days. It was clear there was no teenager under their roof anymore.</p><p>After the burial, once everyone walked out of the property with their heads hung low and their eyes swollen, after crying their young hearts out again. As if it was the perfect end to complete the circle that had taken them through so much loss. The remaining Spellman’s had clutched the hands of their significant others as they walked back inside.</p><p>Lilith had walked a broken Zelda back to the parlor, helped her sit next to their own babe, hoping at least it would remind her those good things were still in store for all of them. But she knew out of her experience that navigating grief wasn’t so easy.</p><p>Doctor Cee had followed her lead and Hilda too was sitting in her usual armchair, her knitting needles beside her. Ambrose and Prudence had collapsed to the ground, still shocked.</p><p>After making sure everything was as good as it could be, Doctor Cee turned around, heading for the kitchen to start lunch, or whatever they could call it at that time of the day. Lilith stopped him by taking his hand in hers. A light reassuring squeeze followed and a short thankful smile caressed her face. They too were broken; Sabrina had found a way to warm up their hearts too. But at this point, it was their duty to be the supporting arm, the hand that cleared away the tears.</p><p>The image at the parlor was heartbreaking. They were all unseeingly staring ahead, eyes rimmed red and swollen. Noses clogged and breathings coming out ragged as they tried…. They really tried… to remain strong for the others.</p><p>She might not have uttered a word, but Zelda knew Lilith was there, caring for them, worrying… breaking. The redhead raised her hand and a thin, freckled one found it. Warmth and cold coming into contact as a balm to soothe their pains. A strip of aloe over a third-degree burn, calming but still miles away of being enough.</p><p>Cerberus cleared his throat a moment or perhaps hours later, and blue eyes fell on him. “Soup is ready.” He announced, his voice so far from the cheery tone that he usually used that brought a fresh batch of tears out of all eyes. Lilith nodded, and almost in reverent silence, they helped them to the kitchen.</p><p>The scene from the night before is repeated in front of them as a bad cartoon that you cannot stop watching. Eyes never meeting, tears streaming down silently, sniffling and sighs that taught about their broken hearts. It would take time for them to remember what it was, to feel something besides the pain and emptiness.</p><p>Ambrose was the first one to stand up, dropping his plate to the sink and quietly washing it. His eyes dark and lost, his shoulders slumped. With a last glance towards his Aunties, he disappeared to his room. Not even sparing a glance towards Prudence.</p><p>The young witch lowered her head for a second, and when she raised it, her eyes fell on Lilith and she knew where the young woman would go. Once upon a time, when she was the one in terrible grief, Lilith had carved Cain’s seal into Blackwood’s wrist, hoping that knowing they could kill him thousands of times and never die, would bring Zelda back to get her revenge. Now, she figured that at least someone would enjoy it. She nodded, and with a thankful, barely-there smile, Lilith waved her hand and Prudence disappeared from the room.</p><p>Lilith glanced towards her brother-in-law -could she even call him brother-in-law if she wasn’t married to Zelda? Her mind stupidly provided as some sort of distraction -. With a slight nod, she made sure he took care of his wife. Cerberus offered her a sad smile and then sat next to Hilda.</p><p>His hand found the one the blonde was using to stir the soup she never ate, and with a soft touch, the spoon was freed, and Hilda buried her head in the crook of his neck. Lilith could see Zelda’s eyes on her sister and could also feel how close she was to her most definitive breaking point.</p><p>The redhead’s spoon fell to her plate with a loud clattering, and Doctor Cee took it as a sign that they needed to go. Pulling Hilda up with him, he spared a glance to the two women and slowly made their way up the long winding stairs and into Hilda’s old room.</p><p>“Finally,” Zelda muttered bitterly and stood up, brushing past Lilith. With a wave of her hand, all plates were in the sink and she started to wash them. The former demoness knew better than pretending everything was all right. She also knew that things took time and her Zelda was one that needed to keep her mind occupied. Lilith let her have this time to herself, to pretend she could piece herself together by cleaning some stupid plates while she made sure their babe was fed and then asleep.</p><p>When she returned to the room, the water was still falling on top of the dirty plates, and Zelda was still standing there, looking at nothing at all. “Come,” Lilith said, rescuing pale hands from the brutal water that had wrinkled them. With a look over her shoulders, Lilith willed the place clean and she took her love to bed.</p><p>They started the stairs and once they reached the top, Zelda couldn’t help but give one wishing look over the foyer. Eyes clinging to the door, willing it to come open for Sabrina to come in, telling them loudly all about the last mischief she was deep into. But only silence came… silence and the painful meow of her familiar that was now doomed to a fate akin to his owner.</p><p>Zelda thought for a second that it was only fitting that death was so silent when life was so loud and vibrant. Before she turned in the arms of her lover and found her anew. “We are almost there,” Lilith whispered as she noticed the pout on pink lips that had long lost the cover of the lipstick.</p><p>Redhead tresses bobbed up and down as the redhead nodded silently, hiding her face once more in the crook of her lover’s neck, allowing herself to be carried to her room by the strength of her lithe girlfriend.</p><p>Once behind locked doors, Lilith carefully divested her of her clothes and walked her to the bathroom where the tub sat filled with warm water. The sweet scent of chamomile reached Zelda’s nose and tears sprouted again. This time not for what she had lost, but for the one she’d won.</p><p>A peck on the inner side of her wrist, as Zelda had done million times before, was all the former demoness gave her before she led her to sit in the tub. Lilith sat behind Zelda’s back and slowly massaged her head, washing her hair as she hummed softly to some song she had heard mothers sing to their babes during her millennia-long life. To the redhead’s utter surprise, she felt the tension leaving her forehead and shoulders… she felt her body relax against all odds. When she wasn’t more than mush inside the tub, Lilith’s strong arms pulled her up and brought her to bed.</p><p>The Spellman witch didn’t know exactly what had happened between the time the former demoness pulled her up from the bath and the next morning. All she knew was that she had woken up feeling loved and warm in her lover’s arm. She turned around to find her Lily still asleep, a rarity in itself, and with the pads of her thumbs, she traced the tired lines under her eyes.</p><p>Her breathing changed, pointing to Zelda that Lilith was awake, and a soft smile appeared on her face before she felt guilty for smiling when there was so much pain all around them. “Don’t… We need to learn to laugh again, and that ... that only starts with an honest smile.” Zelda had whispered, afraid that if she spoke louder than that everything would wake up, including the still muffled pain in her own soul.</p><p>Slowly, she caressed Lilith’s lips with her own. A plea, a thank you… She placed the ever-present strands of dark hair behind her ear and smiled too. “I knew you would make it up to me, Lily.” She said thinking that it was only days before when she had uttered those words and how devastatingly different things were now.</p><p>“But, I…” Lilith tried, confused because she was certain it wasn’t that what Zelda meant when she had stopped her before meeting the ‘infernal court’. Another smile, soft… sad… loving… a peck on her lips that left her even more confused.</p><p>“Retribution doesn’t always mean sex, Lily. Sometimes, it means that you love me in silence just to give me space to be,” she said, her words failing her as her eyes filled with tears and her heart tugged in pain. “Love… you have no idea what you mean to me… you are so, so precious…”</p><p>Lilith gulped as tears also formed in her eyes and they kissed, mouth moving slowly as they tasted each other’s emotions poured into their exchange.</p><p>A loud bang startled them from their morning, and it was then that they noticed the noise coming from Sabrina’s room.</p><p>“Hilda,” Zelda said, jumping to her feet and finding herself still naked. With a wave of her hands, she covered herself and rushed to her niece’s room. Lilith following close.</p><p>Inside Sabrina’s room, chaos reigned. There were boxes, clothes scattered around in piles, and half-packed in opened boxes, and there was Salem meowing in pain on top of an unmade bed. Amid it all, there was Hilda, crumpled on the floor and holding for dear life to Sabrina’s favorite blanket as she cried her heart out.</p><p>“Oh, Hildy…” she said, and not caring about how it would look, the redhead sat on the floor next to her sister and embraced her tightly. Hilda’s face hid in the crook of Zelda’s neck as she sobbed. Her body shaking with each painful minute.</p><p>“I can’t, Zelds. I can’t… how can I live when she’s not here? She was our baby, Zelds…” she mumbled, her nose stuffy and her breathing erratic as she fought with tears that were threatening to drown her.</p><p>“I know, Hildy... I know… It hurts… It will take time, love.” She cooed. “Don’t worry about Sa-Sabrina’s room, love… We’ll take care of it when it’s time. Now, why don’t you go searching for that husband of yours, and then, after breakfast… we can all head out to the Academy for her wake… what do you say?”</p><p>“You’ve always been the stronger of the two,” Hilda said with a defeated huff. Zelda’s eyes filled with tears. “I had to be, Hildy… I was given no choice, but the truth is, you are far stronger than I can ever be. You never closed yourself off afraid of pains like this, and I… I hid away until it was impossible for me not to. You are so much more than I could ever be… And I… I admire you, Hilda Spellman.” She said, placing a kiss on her cheek before extending a hand towards Lilith who had been standing far away enough to give them privacy. “Help me up, darling.”</p><p>With a tug, Lilith pulled Zelda up, and together they helped Hilda to stand up. “And whatever it happens, Hilda, you’ll always have us,” Lilith added. The blonde Spellman threw herself to Lilith, embracing her tightly as a new batch of tears filled her eyes. “Thank you, Lilith.” She whispered before leaving the room.</p><p>At the academy, students and friends gathered around Hecate’s statue. A statue of Sabrina was unveiled, to the Spellman’s surprise. Yet, words lacked. Getting stuck on sore throats that despite it all still weren’t ready to accept the departure of their Sabrina, lest with a gold statue that was carved as her.</p><p>But they had gathered to remember their ‘Brina and seeing everyone at a loss for words. It was Theo, the first one to speak. Telling them all how Sabrina had all but adopted him. One by one, memories the adults had not heard were shared, bringing a little joy to all of them.</p><p>Just as slowly as the comforting memories were out, people left the room.</p><p>Even though more than one of them left wondering why was it that they saw their High Priestess holding Lilith’s babe, they couldn’t care the less. Until the moment Lilith’s gaze fell on Zelda’s and a questioning look was answered with a certain nod.</p><p>The former demoness walked towards her love and picked their babe up, pecking Zelda’s cheek, and giving her a reassuring sideway embrace. “Are you sure?” she whispered, and the redhead nodded with a calm sureness. “In the morning,” she said, looking to the side. The brunette’s eyes fell on the blonde that remained and left them alone and made sure no one would interrupt her.</p><p>“She looks beautiful, doesn’t she, Hildy?” Zelda questioned the moment they were alone; her voice didn’t tremble.</p><p>“Yeah. She does.” Hilda answered, struggling to find her voice. “Zelds, uh… I was thinking… that Doctor Cee and I… will probably just move back into the mortuary… ‘cause we Spellmans, we should stick together, I think,” she sighed, barely able to contain her tears.</p><p>“All right.” She turned her head to face her sister. “If you think so, why? Why did you not preserve her, Dark Mother?” she questioned her own creator, finding new tears to cry.</p><p>“I don’t know.” Hilda shook her head.</p><p>“It’s not right, Hilda. It’s just not right that she’s gone.” Zelda said, and Hilda thought she was finally going to break.</p><p>“Come on, let’s go…” she said, embracing her older sister and walking her away from the statue.</p><p>That night, the silence was once again part of the night routine. Even their babe seemed to have understood it. Zelda walked out of the house, her eyes fixated on the cemetery as she smoked, hoping to relieve some of her pain. Lilith came out after a while, her hands surrounding her waist and her chin finding a home in Zelda’s shoulders. They stood like that, at the mercy of the elements, until the first lights of the sun shone, and as always, utterly unaware of the pains of the beings that lived on Earth, another day began.</p><p>It was late, Hilda realized when she walked down to the kitchen and found the old grandfather’s clock. She heard voices coming from the parlor and she followed them. But before she could enter, she found Lilith right outside the door, with their babe in her arms and patiently waiting. Zelda came out a second later, and Hilda realized something was utterly wrong.</p><p>“Zelds?” she asked. It took her a second to understand what was going on. “You are leaving, aren’t you?” Hilda questioned, feeling betrayed at being left alone to fend for herself after all that had happened. She had hoped… she had…</p><p>“We are, Hildy… we need to… and you are not alone.” With those words, she walked Hilda to the parlor. Cerberus, Ambrose, Prudence, Agatha, Melvin, Harvey, Theo, Ros, and even the old witches that joined their order were there, expectantly waiting. “I’ll give you, your High Priestess,” Zelda said, placing a kiss on Hilda’s cheek.</p><p>With that done, Zelda took Lilith’s hand, and they walked towards the front door. “How do we call you now, Auntie Zee?” Ambrose asked. They stopped at the foyer, twinkling eyes meeting his confused ones. Even with all the heavy grief, they chuckled.</p><p>“Zelda, of course. Who we are to Earth, won’t ever change our bonds, Ambrose,” she winked at him and opened her arms. Her nephew fell into them with childish glee and allowed himself to cry. “I’m going to miss you terribly, Auntie.” He said as his parting words once he had calmed enough.</p><p>“And so, will I,” she said, patting his back and freeing him. “All of you,” she said with a broken voice, “and this stupidly painful house…”</p><p>“How can you leave?” Hilda said, tears falling freely from her ear. Zelda walked to her and hugged her tightly. “Oh, but my dear sister, we will always be just a prayer away,” she said then, and after clearing her own tears, she cleared those of her sister.</p><p>With a last glance over her shoulder, she linked her hand with Lilith’s, and they walked away. “What about Sabrina’s room?” Hilda shouted, stopping them.</p><p>They exchanged a glance and their babe chose that moment to let herself be known. “It will be taken care of, don’t you worry.” Lilith threw over her shoulder as they turned around again, and for a reason still unknown to the Spellmans a weight lifted off from Zelda’s heart as a certainty filled the void that Sabrina had left.</p><p>“What about Hell?” Zelda asked, feeling far more composed than before once her feet hit the ground of the Spellman property. “What are we going to do with it?”</p><p>“I’ve come to understand there’s no Hell, love. There’s only this realm. We separated it with our differences. I created Hell when I ran away from the garden, away from them, and they were always around us. It’s only the afterlife… and it can be whatever whoever believes in it makes it so. There’s no need for more soul contracts, nine circles, tortures, everyone can just go to Elysium if they so believe… Granted, we will have to pop in there every once in a while to make sure they don’t make a mess of that beautiful castle we created... but it’s just you and me and our child...” Lilith shrugged as they strolled away from the house.</p><p>“And the Academy?” She added with a bit of uncertainty. Lilith stopped, “and the academy, I guess. So, are you really ready to lose that old building?”</p><p>“Yes. It’s time for Hilda to be who she always was supposed to be.” Zelda shrugged. “And who would you be then?” the former demoness wondered.</p><p>A bright mischievous smile appeared on thin lips, a cocky grin really. “Did you know Phiona means Gift from God?” She said as if it was the best of the pickup lines. Lilith chuckled. “I’m loathed to tell you but that’s wrong love… It means Gift from the Goddess. Wait, so does that mean that you are Phiona now? That will get some time to get used to…”</p><p>“No, I’m your gift from the Goddess… Your Zelda…” She said as seriously as she could but struggling to keep her laughter contained.</p><p>“Oh, Heavens, you are so corny…” Unable to contain herself any longer, Zelda’s warm lips found hers, stopping her from adding another word. It was quite chaste for being who they are, but it worked. “We will come to visit though.”</p><p>“I wouldn’t have it any other way. Besides, I’m sure you promised your sister she would be the one in charge of the naming ceremony. I’m sure she will find a way to pray your brain out if we don’t visit.”</p><p>“Right,” Zelda said. Her eyes widened in terror. Then she shook her head, “So, love… just then when Hilda asked about Sabrina’s room… did you remember seeing a not-so-distant future of our child?”</p><p>Lilith smirked then. “Vividly. I suppose there’s one more thing we ought to do before we go, don’t we?”</p><p>Inside the house, the remaining inhabitants watch them, confused by their antics. Hilda rubbed her chest where her heart ached for the recent loss and the idea of having to live without Zelda. They watch them stop and kiss before they change directions and head towards the cemetery.</p><p>“Uh, Auntie?” Ambrose asks as they watch the couple lower the baby on the floor away from both Sabrina’s graves. Yet still on their eyesight. “What are they doing?”</p><p>“I…” Hilda frowns, confused. Hope blossoms in her as she presses her husbands’ hand tightly, “have no clue,” she says, looking at them in awe as they seemed to glow anew in the empty holy ground.</p><p>By the Sabrinas’ graves, the daimons stand in silent reverence. Lilith’s hand tugs Zelda and blue eyes find green. “I remember your words from… God, has it only been two days? You were looking right to me when you said them.”</p><p>“Which ones?” Zelda questioned.</p><p>“For they are both our daughters,” the former demoness said with teary eyes. “I might not have raised her as you did, but I loved that imp of a girl. Both of them.” Lilith says fighting with her emotions.</p><p>“We can’t have them both, Lily,” Zelda says loud enough, not quite knowing if she’s saying those words for Lilith or herself. Lily chuckles, “one will be more than enough to keep up, I’m sure. Ready?”</p><p>A nod later, they move to stand each to one side of Sabrina Spellman’s grave. Closing their eyes, they claim their powers, their wings grow as they float inches away from the floor, a golden aura shining bright against the blue sky that opened. Flowers sprouting all around them as nature responded to them.</p><p>“I, Phiona, daughter of the Goddess, command you…”</p><p>“I, Lilitu, daughter of the God, command you…”</p><p>They say at once, opening their eyes to lock into the other’s gaze.</p><p>They feel their energies raising around them, then lowering beneath the Earth to where they directed it, and soon, they feel her every cell being slowly awoken from the stasis they were before.</p><p>“Raise, Sabrina Spellman, for your life it’s yet to be over,” they say as one.</p><p>An expansive wave comes out of their fluttering wings, and the ground above Sabrina’s coffin disappears. The lid that protected the teenager’s body from the elements it’s also gone, and inside the open casket, Sabrina Edwina Diana Spellman Morningstar…. Sleeps.</p><p>Zelda’s feet are the first to touch the ground, and the golden glow that took over them disappears along with their wings. “Wake up, Sabrina. It’s time…” Zelda coos as she kneels, touching the soft cheek that now was warm underneath her fingers.</p><p>“Auntie Zee?” The teenager asks, frowning in confusion, “Lilith?”</p><p>“Welcome back, Sabrina,” the former demoness smiles impishly at her, then they help her out of the grave. “What? What happened?”</p><p>“I’m sure your Auntie Hilda will have a lot to tell you,” Zelda states, patting her clothes clean from the dirt. Then, she brings the teen closer, engulfing her in a long-needed embrace. Some tears leave her eyes as she places a kiss on her cheek. “And you, Auntie Zee?” the teen asks them, feeling they had left her out of so much more.</p><p>“We are moving out… We need our own space now.” Lilith announces.</p><p>“What? We?” Sabrina frowns, deepens as she looks from his Aunt to Lilith.</p><p>“We’ll see you at the academy in a few days, Sabrina.” Zelda winks at her, turning her around towards the open doors where her family awaits.</p><p>“Come along, babe, we are all done here,” the former demoness says then, picking up their daughter. Once again, they walk, only to be stopped by Sabrina calling them. “Auntie Zee? Lilith? Who’s the babe?”</p><p>“Althea,” Zelda stated. Lilith’s eyes raised to meet green ones and smiled. “The one with the healing power,” the former demoness reckoned with ease.</p><p>“It seems fitting, doesn’t it, love?” The redhead countered by reaching for her family. Lilith can’t help but agree, “it does.”</p><p>“I still don’t understand,” Sabrina shouts, trying to grasp the fact that she is alive, and her Auntie, her rock really, is going away.</p><p>“Your Auntie Hilda has all the details, darling. Now, you... you are the only one who knows our daughter’s name. Be a darling and keep it to yourself. Go, Sabrina… they are waiting for you.”</p><p>“Oh, and Sabrina?” Lilith called. “It’s Auntie Lily, now.” She winked at the dumbfounded expression of the teen. “Let the Spellmans know we will come back for the naming celebration,” she stopped herself and looked at her Zelda. “In a week.”</p><p>“Oh, and tell Hilda… that I was wrong… two years it’s too long, and thirteen months aren’t as many as she believes,” Zelda says cryptically. “Really?” Lilith asks then and a nod later they both share a knowing smile.</p><p>Their happiness can be seen in the thousands of flowers that take over the Spellman’s property as the newly resurrected child rush towards the entrance shouting “Aunt Hilda! Ambrose! Doctor Cee!” and they rush to meet her halfway.</p><p>Laughter erupts from both Daimons and contagiously reaches the Spellman’s who cry and laugh as they hug their lost child. And once Sabrina notices they hadn’t followed her, she turns around and waves to them. Their laughter can still be heard as they disappear, only they know where under the watchful eyes of the newly reunited Spellmans.</p><p>
  <strong>The end</strong>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you all for joining me on this rollercoaster! &lt;3</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Let me know what you think... Should I continue it? Should I stop? Should I get back to the fandom I came from? LOL.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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